DoppelSteele
by Madeleine Gilbert
Summary: S5; Steele Inseparable series, Pt. 9.  Her husband or the agency?  Laura can only save one; she's made her choice.  Now it's a battle to the death across two continents to clear the Steele name & take back what's theirs from Roselli. *Pt 2 Chap 9 is up!*
1. PART I:  Chapter 1

STEELE INSEPARABLE PART IX: DoppelSteele

AUTHOR: Madeleine Gilbert

SYNOPSIS: S5 continuation; ninth in a series. Her husband or the agency? Laura can only save one: she's made her choice. Now it's a battle to the death across two continents to take back what's theirs from Roselli.

SEQUEL TO: Part I, "Steele in Perspective'; Part II, "Steele-In-Law"; Part III, "Ancestral Steele"; Part IV, "Steele in the Shadows"; Part VI, "Notoriously, Steele"; Part VII, "Wife of Steele"; Part VIII, "Something Wicked This Way Steeles"

DISCLAIMER: This story is not for profit and is purely for entertainment purposes. The author does not own the rights to these characters and is not now, nor ever has been, affiliated in any way with _Remington Steele_, its producers, actors and their agents, MTM productions, the NBC television network or with any station or network carrying the show in syndication.

Additional characters from outside the RS canon, apart from historic personages, are fictional and created by the author. Any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

**Author's note: **If the _Steele Inseparable _series had played out according to my original plan, this story would've been posted a year ago—if only "Notoriously, Steele" and "Wife of Steele" hadn't gotten in the way. All in all I can't say I'm sorry for the detour; it gave me countless hours of immersion in the joy of creation. And that, after all, is the reason I'm writing.

I'd like to express my sincere gratitude to everyone who let me know either through a posted review or PM that you'd like me to continue the Steeles' story. The encouragement and support mean more than I can say. Thank you all.

Special thanks to a fellow RS author and reader who was so kind as to share her knowledge of California's licensing procedures for private investigators. She's saved me from falling into an inaccuracy that would've been mortifying if I'd discovered it later (and from hours and hours of revisions.) For the record: the arrangement Laura and Harry agreed to when he came on board as Remington Steele wasn't illegal, nor is Remington Steele lack of a license. But it _could _be viewed as a violation of trust. That's the angle Roselli is playing against the Steeles—threatening exposure of the true nature of the partnership if they attempt to expose him—and how he's bound them in a catch-22 for which they can't find solution.

And now, without further ado…the rest of the story.  
~ MG

* * *

**Dop•pel•gäng•er** (_German._ dŏp'əl-geng-er)  
n. A ghostly double of a living person that haunts its fleshly counterpart.

**Dop•pel•Steele** (dŏp'əl-stēl)  
n. A co-walker or double who plots the demise of Remington Steele in order to take his place.

* * *

PART I

Chapter 1

There was nothing so typically American as traveling the Southwest behind the wheel of an RV, reflected Remington Steele.

Apart from a screening of _Heavens Gate _(Kris Kristofferson, Christopher Walken, Jeff Bridges, United Artists, 1980, running time 149 minutes), there was nothing quite so excruciatingly _dull_, either_._

He ought to know. He'd been at it for the past three days. Ten hours a day of back roads whose pocked, crumbling asphalt made the streets of the Irish villages where he'd lived as a lad seem well-tended in comparison. Seven hundred ninety-seven miles of straggling, dingy towns, drab truck stops and squalid service stations. Three hundred hours of sun-baked land as far as the eye could see—land that offered none of the Technicolor grandeur he'd been led to expect by _Red River, The Big Country_ and _How the West Was Won._ More like the setting for _Easy Rider_, he'd have said, in its inhospitality.

Or, he amended, remembering the motivation for this trip: _Badlands_. Martin Sheen, Sissy Spacek, Warner Brothers, 1970. A suspected murderer and the woman who loves him flee the police across an arid plain and into the unknown.

His wife, Laura, had already pointed the flaws in his analogy out to him. "The guy Martin Sheen played really was a murderer. You, on the other hand, have been framed for a murder you didn't commit. We're not on a killing spree; we're trying to keep you out of jail so we can prove you're innocent. Besides, the Badlands are in South Dakota."

Outwardly he had to concede she was right; privately he added the annotation to the list he was compiling in his head. _The Phantom of Paris._ _The Scarlet Claw. Tension. _Even _The Black Room_ and _Prisoner of Zenda_ afforded a certain perspective if he overlooked the family-resemblance angle. All of them except _Badlands_ were variations on the theme of one man altering his appearance and demeanor, stepping into another man's shoes…and stealing another man's life.

Relevant film plots. In days gone by they were practically the sole contribution he could offer to an ongoing investigation. Now they'd become his way of making sense of the insanity that had begun a week ago with the death of Spotlight News anchorwoman Windsor Thomas at the hand of Remington's nemesis, the man he and Laura had called Tony Roselli.

Who was now calling himself Remington Steele.

Though the aroma of freshly brewed coffee wafted from the living quarters behind him, a tea bag dangled from the covered mug Laura eventually carried into the cabin. After depositing the mug in the proper slot in the center console she lingered behind him, hands on his shoulders. "Ready for a break?"

"In a bit." Lifting his right hand from the wheel, he caught hers so he could kiss it and hold it to his cheek. "Come and keep me company a while."

It didn't take her long to accommodate his request. Back with her own mug, she sank into the passenger seat and curled her legs under her. Automatically she and Remington reached for each other. And, as the RV seemed to chase and then overtake the sunrise, they sat quiet, linked hands lying on the console between them.

By now it was near on eight in the morning, which added another hour on the road to the total they'd already racked up. The night before he'd calculated that they'd roughly four hundred miles left to travel. If all went well, they should arrive in Denver around two o'clock.

Denver. The home of their erstwhile colleague, Murphy Michaels. Laura wanted to hire him to prove Roselli had murdered Windsor Thomas. 'He's the only one who can help us, Remington,' she'd insisted.

Last week the mere suggestion had catapulted him to the height of indignation. Odd, but he couldn't seem to conjure up that sense of outrage anymore. He couldn't even recall what if felt like. Too much had befallen him and Laura in the interval. Appealing to Murphy for assistance had become nothing more than a minor irritation, a distasteful duty he had to discharge if he meant to fulfill the resolve that had been hardening in him since the moment Roselli had unleashed catastrophe upon them.

The wreckage extended in every direction. The agency gone, Laura's labor of love vanished down the drain during a travesty of a press conference called by Roselli. The Remington Steele persona wrested from them, possibly for good. He, Remington, bound in a web of circumstances that implicated him as chief suspect in the murder Roselli had committed. And all because he'd thoughtlessly taken credit for the capture of Sterling Fitch last May—credit Roselli believed belonged to him-and disclosed his presence at Ashford Castle to the Irish police, who had taken Roselli into custody.

Not to mention Laura, his new bride, publicly choosing him over Roselli. Mustn't forget that tiny little faux pas.

Laura hadn't. Worse, she was reserving the lion's share of blame for the entire debacle for herself. 'I should've seen it coming,' she said the night of the press conference in which Roselli had announced he was the real Remington Steele. With minor and unremarkable variations, that had been her contention ever since.

Remington begged to differ with her. Certainly it was clear in hindsight what Roselli had been up to all those months when he was breaking into their office on a nightly basis in order to comb through their files. But before last Thursday? His purposes were by no means so easy to fathom. Part of it was because he'd played the game cannily from the beginning, testing out his nascent Steele masquerade in innocuous arenas like a sweater shop in Maine and a university lecture in Massachusetts. Laura was perfectly justified in writing off those incidents as the work of a harmless crank. Nor could she have conceived that Roselli would return to the scene of another horrific crime he'd perpetrated: the murder by strangulation of U.S. Immigration Officer Gladys Lynch. By rights he should've been cowering in the deepest cover, praying he'd never be found out. Who'd have guessed he possessed the colossal audacity to draw public attention to himself under the very nose of the LAPD, whose most-wanted list he still topped, along with the FBI's?

Hubris. The bastard didn't suffer from a lack of it.

But even hubris wouldn't have availed Roselli, Remington was convinced, if not for a favorable confluence of events. Spotlight News anchorwoman Windsor Thomas had long considered Remington's past a compelling mystery and decided it was up to her to discover what he was hiding. Two weeks of poking around the Riviera had evidently provided her with a solution that satisfied her. All the Steeles knew for sure was that she'd searched for Armand Lortie, one of Remington's old partners in the smuggling operation he'd run on the Riviera in the seventies, and dropped in on him at his home in suburban Nice. Their brief meeting had so unnerved Lortie, he'd taken the unprecedented step of contacting Remington via telex to warn him he'd been made.

But the damage was done. Windsor returned to Los Angeles and wove what she'd learned about Remington's involvement in _Cuillerier_ _et fils_ and his alias, Jean Murrell, into a Spotlight News exclusive. That much Remington heard from her own lips, the fulfillment of her promise that when she was ready to shred his reputation before a television audience of tens of thousands, she'd notify him first. He had to hand it to her: she was true to her word. Bad luck on her that she happened to ring him at the agency at a moment when Roselli was monitoring a covert eavesdropping device he'd concealed at some point in Remington's office.

Bad luck on Remington, too.

For he'd rushed immediately to her home in Laurel Canyon in response to her invitation, harboring the pathetic hope that he could persuade her to see reason—or at the very least negotiate a compromise. As it turned out, he missed Roselli by minutes. Windsor was already dead of a gunshot wound. And Roselli was on his way to the Steeles' to plant the gun he'd used on her in their safe.

How would the story have played out if it hadn't occurred to Laura not long afterward to retrieve Remington's Colt from that same safe? The question had cost Remington several nights' sleep in the relative security of his and Laura's hideout at Lake Malibu. All he could say was, thank heaven she had; it had provided the clue that told them Roselli was behind the frame. The pistol he'd used to murder Windsor was one he'd stolen from Laura's handbag six months prior. Laura had recognized it just in time to hide it from Lieutenant Jarvis, head of the LAPD's homicide division, when he showed up unannounced on the Steeles' doorstep.

That visit, more than anything else, had fueled her conviction that they couldn't go back to Los Angeles anytime soon. Remington still wasn't quite sure why she was so adamant about it. But if there was anything he'd learned over five years of partnership, it was to trust Laura's instincts. Better to keep as far away as possible from a crusading cop who needed a quick arrest to quell public outcry over Windsor's death before it became deafening. On that issue Remington had come to agree with her.

But not on the matter of her guilt. Where she was wracking her brain to reassemble the sequence of events into a pattern she should've been clever enough to tease out, he perceived nothing but random mischance and a momentary advantage to Roselli. Gently but firmly, Remington was working to bring Laura round to that view. And anyway, only an imagination as diseased as Roselli's could've manufactured such a monstrous plan in the first place; nobody could've predicted he would exact revenge on them in this fashion.

Nobody could've predicted the magnitude of the backlash against them, either.

Or perhaps, taking into account how quickly their reputation plummeted in September, when Roselli tipped off the press that he'd broken into the agency, the Steeles _could_ have predicted it. They just hadn't done it. Remington for his part could point unerringly to the reason for his failure to focus on eventual consequences and potential outcomes. Anxiety over Laura. It had overshadowed, blotted out, practically obliterated, every other concern.

Forget the past tense. He was still worried about her, and right to be, in his opinion. She wasn't herself. She hadn't been since the night Roselli stole the agency. He wouldn't presume to say he could read her like a book—a claim that always grated on his last nerve when she made it about him—but he did flatter himself he knew her better than anyone else in the world. And he'd stood shoulder to shoulder with her through enough adversity to recognize the way she dealt with it. Combative, impatient, confused, scared, puzzled, furious, exhausted, fed up, irritated, bewildered, so weakened by poison that she was forced to allow him to carry her to safety: each could've described Laura during some crisis or another over the years. Not once, however, had he seen her surrender voluntarily to anyone or anything. Never had he seen her lose the will to fight.

Never, that was, until now. And it was scaring the hell out of him.

"It's over," was what she'd said in the first moments following Roselli's announcement that he was the real Remington Steele. "The agency…Remington Steele…It's all over." A perfectly natural reaction-but temporary, Remington had assumed. As soon as the initial shock had worn off, and they'd assessed the damage, she'd snap out of it and bounce back more determined than ever to win back what was rightfully theirs.

Wrong on all three counts, he was.

The single ray of light in the situation was that she was consenting to lean on him. Granted, it wasn't as completely as he'd have liked—damsel in distress was a role Laura would never adopt by choice, no matter how much he might yearn in secret to act her knight in shining armor—but she hadn't run away or closed herself off from him. The finer bonds of trust they'd recently forged when she confided the truth about her father were holding fast. And for that he was overflowing with gratitude.

He'd admitted nothing of this to her, especially not while he held her close in the aftermath of that nightmarish press conference. He'd had a hard enough time coaxing her into his arms as it was. Instead he'd limited himself to resting his cheek on her hair and struggled to ignore a fresh stab of dismay at how fragile she suddenly seemed to have become within the space of a few short minutes.

They might've stood there forever in their usual cabin at Twin Pines Rentals—it was definitely more comfortable than facing reality—if Laura hadn't begun to shiver. Reluctant though he was to release her, he crossed the room to switch on a lamp and grab the suit jacket he'd shed on arrival. "Here. Before you catch your death."

"Right now I'd consider that the lesser of two evils," she said dryly as she slipped her arms through the sleeves. Catching his look, she gave him a wan smile. "Gallows humor. Sorry."

"I'm familiar with the impulse, my love."

After buttoning her up he steered her to the edge of the bed and knelt at her feet. "Now's probably as good a time as any to try and ring Mildred, eh? What do you think? It's dark enough to venture out and look for a pay phone."

The wave of apprehension that swept her face was too obvious to miss, but her voice had achieved something akin to its usual steadiness. "Maybe that's not such a good idea after all. Even a call from a pay phone can be traced. If the police decide to check her phone records, it'll lead them straight to us."

"Billie might be helpful in that regard." He felt her stiffen in alarm and hastened to add, "I've already told her about Windsor. She's on our side."

"Thank God someone is."

They found Billie in the main room of her cabin, placidly knitting to the accompaniment of a wildlife documentary. She hollered a welcome through the screen door and put her needlework aside to rise and envelope Laura in a gigantic hug. "There you are, cutie. What a sight for sore eyes."

Her warmth seemed to ease some of Laura's tension; Remington was glad of it. He was even more encouraged by the eagerness with which Billie jumped at the opportunity to do them a service. Soon she was leaving a cryptic message on Mildred's home answering machine: "The pound of striped bass and two pounds of trout you ordered is ready. Please call Chelsea Nash in Twin Pines for pick up information, 555-6627."

"Excellent improvisation," Remington congratulated her when she'd finished. "But which one of us is the bass, and which one's the trout?"

"That's up to you kids to decide. I'm staying out of the middle." It wasn't so much a twinkle in her eye as a shrewd but compassionate gleam, appraising both Steeles; it rested longest on Remington. "While we're waiting for Mildred to call back, maybe you can explain why that guy was on the news, trying to convince the world he's you."

Laura sagged in her seat on the sofa. "You saw him."

"Saw him? I couldn't get away from him. He was hogging every channel."

Alert to Laura's muffled groan of discouragement, Remington perched on the sofa arm nearest her and reached for her hand. "An old enemy with a score to settle," he said.

"The one who killed Windsor Thomas?" asked Billie.

"The very one."

"Must be a hell of a score."

"Only in his head. But in this case I suppose it's all that matters."

Billie gestured, conveying her bewilderment. "Okay, I know it's none of my business, but where does he get off pretending he's Remington Steele? And why aren't you going after him with both barrels?"

The Steeles exchanged a look.

"There are some…irregularities…in the way we operate as an agency," Laura replied at last. "Nothing illegal, but if they're revealed, they'll raise serious questions about our integrity. And a reputation for integrity's like gold in this business. Once it's lost, it's practically impossible to get it back."

"We may as well adopt another line of work altogether," agreed Remington. He was thinking of sundry alumni of the legendary Havenhurst Agency, former colleagues of Laura's whom he'd met five years ago at a reunion weekend that would live forever in his memory. The fates of Sandy Maxwell, Carl Wallace and Donald Ottoson: each was a cautionary tale on the way in which a single ethical lapse could forever blight a PI's career.

They would've confided more to Billie, but Mildred had chosen that moment to ring the cabin. Remington watched with a sinking feeling as Billie handed the phone over to Laura. He wished so much that his and Laura's positions were reversed that he briefly debated snatching the handset from her grasp. No doubt Mildred was going to need a hefty dose of reassurance at the turn events had taken. How would Laura manage it when she was barely coping herself?

There he underestimated his wife. Though Laura's hello was delivered in the subdued little voice she'd developed in the wake of Roselli's announcement, she said all the right things as Mildred poured out the shock and fear of the past several hours. And she went on to explain the situation on their end, the listening device in the office that had prevented the Steeles from speaking to Mildred sooner, the evidence Laura had discovered of Roselli's frame, the motivation behind their flight to Twin Pines.

As it happened, Mildred had had almost as rough a time as they. Late in the afternoon Jarvis had made an appearance at the agency, asking loaded questions and demanding the whereabouts of Mr. Steele. It had afforded her a certain amount of smug satisfaction to be able to tell him truthfully that she didn't know, she hadn't seen or heard from the chief in ages. Hoping one or both of the Steeles would eventually call in, she'd stayed late, only to be pinned to the office by the press conference. Afterwards she was forced to barricade herself in Laura's office, lights off, while reporters pounded on the main doors and shook them by their handles. Meanwhile a barrage of incoming calls had assaulted the phones; she'd begun taking messages off the answering machine, but was daunted by the sheer number of them-

At that point the conversation took an abrupt turn. Instead of relaying Mildred's side to him line by line, as she had up to then, Laura simply stood and listened. Her responses sounded terse and enigmatic to Remington's ears, her grip on the handset was white-knuckled. The longer Mildred spoke, the bleaker her expression became.

Suddenly she turned and thrust the phone at him. "You talk to her."

He wavered a moment, torn between the sight of the screen door slamming behind his wife and the telephone in his hand. It needed Mildred's "Mrs. Steele? Mrs. Steele! Are you there—?" to rouse him.

Billie was hurrying after Laura, to his relief. "Yes, Mildred, yes, it's me, Mr. Steele," he said into the mouthpiece.

"Chief! Thank God! Is Mrs. Steele all right?"

"A trifle overwhelmed. She just needs a chance to get her feet back under her. Speaking of which, how are you holding up?"

"Better, now that I know what's going on. But, oh, chief, that slime ball—that rat—! How can he get away with this-?"

"He's fiendishly clever, that's how. Not to mention ruthless. And he's impaled us on the horns of a nasty dilemma."

Mildred was struggling to catch up; he suspected it even before she admitted it aloud. "I'm not sure I'm following you."

"It's the license. By law Laura didn't need one to hire me to pose as Remington Steele. The only way to prove Roselli's is a fake is to show Remington Steele never really existed…that Laura's the licensed private detective, not me…that all this time, we've been perpetrating a hoax."

"Oh, my God."

"That's just for starters. Don't forget he's raised a red flag that will completely blow us out of the water, once the State Licensing Bureau comes to hear of it. If they haven't already."

"You mean…the discrepancy in the signatures?"

"The proof's there in black and white, sufficient to implicate me as the fraud and impostor he's declared me to be. I'll wager it's only a matter of time before someone starts digging around in my past to discover who I really am."

Put into words, it struck him afresh, the blackness of their circumstances. He raised a hand to his eyes as if by covering them he could somehow shut the knowledge out. Silence of some duration settled between him and Mildred.

She broke it by saying, "Can we win this one, Mr. Steele? Or is this the end of everything?" The quaver in her voice was audible.

He wanted to buck her up. Truly he did. It was how the strong, stalwart, compassionate Remington Steele—the one Laura had created, the man he liked to flatter himself he'd in some measure become—would've reacted. But all he could do was pinch the bridge of his nose more tightly and shake his head.

"Damned if I know, Mildred," he said grimly. "Damned if I know."

* * *

By the time Remington returned to his and Laura's cabin, she'd already showered and changed. Wrapped in her dressing gown, her hair tumbling in damp tendrils about her shoulders, she was sitting up in bed—just sitting there idly, without so much as a book in her hand. He tried to tell himself she was waiting for him because it was better than believing she was too demoralized to focus on the printed page.

She watched as he hunted in a suitcase for a pair of pajamas. "You brought Mildred up to speed?" she said.

"As far as possible. Naturally I couldn't answer the most important question of all."

"And that was-?"

"What we're going to do next. We've some choices to make, Laura. And we need to make them soon."

"I know. Frances and my mother have been trying to get a hold of us, by the way."

"So Mildred said." The information had shed substantial light on the reason for Laura's precipitous departure from Billie's, but this he kept to himself.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Absorbed in a search for his shaving kit, he didn't glance up. "What's what supposed to mean?"

" 'So Mildred said'. Don't bother answering. I know exactly what it means."

Ah, yes, her unshakable conviction that she could read him like a book. He was wondering when it would rear its ugly head. On the other hand, in the midst of upheaval, turmoil and loss, it was good to see some things never changed.

"You think I shouldn't have put them off," she was saying.

"I do?"

"You think it was wrong not to call them back."

Now he did meet her eyes. She was deliberately challenging him; he'd have had to be blind and deaf not to realize it. Typical behavior, it was. Annoyed with herself for her earlier weakness, perhaps suffering from guilt over what she regarded as neglect of her family, she was preparing to take it out on him.

There's my girl, he thought, hiding a smile.

Misdirected or not, her indignation was rising. To defuse it he said mildly, "It's not what I think that matters, is it? It's for you to decide." He paused on his way to the bathroom to lift a tress of her hair and squeeze it between affectionate fingers. "But for the record, I'd rather you waited until you feel you can handle it. And I've asked Mildred to let them know we're okay and we'll get in touch as soon as we can."

That removed a good deal of the wind from her sails; he even imagined he sensed a degree of contrition when he joined her in bed, though he couldn't be sure, since he was judging by the promptness with which she moved into his arms. "I'll talk to Mother and Frances first thing tomorrow," she said by way of apology.

"A wise idea. Exactly the option I'd have proposed if you'd asked my advice."

There was a trace of sly humor in the gaze she fastened on his face. "Really? And if I decided it's too dangerous, no contact with family until this mess is behind us? What would you say then?"

"The same. I know what's expected of me as a husband, even if I don't always appear to."

She laughed at that—not loud or long, which would've been asking too much, but it was her first genuine laugh in hours. To him it held all the sweetness there could possibly exist in the world, as well as the promise of renewed hope and joy.

All too soon it died away. "I can't face them yet," she said. "Not tonight. I guess that makes me a coward, huh? On top of everything else?"

"It makes you an amazing woman who's bearing the weight of the world on her shoulders and more. And who needs a good night's sleep." He reached over and switched off the lamp. "Things'll look better by the light of day. You'll see."

"Will they?"

"Of course they will. They always do." He kissed her forehead, kissed her lips, wrapped her more securely in his embrace.

And, staring into the alien darkness of the cabin that wasn't their home, added, but only to himself:

They had to. God knew they certainly couldn't get any worse.

TO BE CONTINUED


	2. PART I:  Chapter 2

Chapter 2

But the situation did get worse. Of course it did. Before the morning was half over, as a matter of fact.

Remington woke slowly, which was habitual for him, and with a confused impression of angry voices fogging his brain, which was not. A nightmare? If so, it wasn't coming back to him. Besides, the sight of Laura in the chair across the room, fully dressed, absent gaze directed out the window, put it right out of his head.

She glanced his way when he sat up and called her name. "Hi," she said.

Nothing to read in that monosyllable, he concluded. "Are you all right?"

"Fine. It seems congratulations are in order for both of us."

"It's far too early in the day for non sequiturs, Laura."

"We made the morning papers. The _Times_ and the _Trib_."

"How do you know?"

"Frances."

Extraordinary, since, if memory served, the Pipers didn't take the weekday _Times. _It also explained the snippet of conversation that had invaded his slumber. "You've spoken to her already?"

"And Mother."

"From here? But what if the police-"

"I know, I know, it was stupid of me. I just wanted to get it over with. I think it's safe to say it wasn't the most fun I've ever had."

Given Laura's bent towards understatement, that meant her family had cut up rough. But what form had it taken? Tears and hysterics? A tongue-lashing from Abigail? Whichever, it was clear Laura hadn't received any support from that quarter. He wanted desperately to ask, but her shuttered features and air of touch-me-not reserve warned him off.

Instead he said, "What about the papers?"

"The press conference is front-page news. No big surprise there. What everyone's clamoring to know is, where are you, and when are you going to surface to refute the accusations? Oh, and you're wanted for questioning in connection with the shooting death of Windsor Thomas. Looks like we're sharing the spotlight with her again after all, Mr. Steele."

That ironical remark cast a pall over the rest of the conversation. Nor was Laura helpful in reviving it. Probably it was just as well to let it die, he thought, and went off to shower.

When he'd done, he spent a few minutes evaluating his appearance in the mirror and then laid his razor aside. Last-minute impulse had persuaded him not to shave the previous night; twenty-four hours' worth of beard was darkening his cheeks and chin. Already the face looking back at him didn't seem to belong so exclusively to Remington Steele. He could just about pass for the Australian art thief and all around shady operator, Douglas Quintaine, or a blue-eyed version of Paul Fabrini. In a day or two, the transformation would be complete.

Experimentally he tousled his hair instead of brushing it smooth as he usually did. Even better. Thank God he'd packed for the trip to Connecticut with an eye towards comfort as well as style, making sure to mix in casual shirts and sweaters, jeans and trousers. It meant he wasn't locked into an interminable succession of button-downs and ties, the elements of that enviable, but oftentimes restrictive, wardrobe of Steele's—

It was then he drew himself up, suddenly hearing his train of thought. What the hell was he doing, referring to Steele in the third person? _He_ was Remington Steele. Never mind that he'd appropriated the name against her will that night at the Huntington Ritz; Laura had freely bestowed it on him two days later, so to speak, when she allowed him to step into Steele's shoes in the presence of a client. It was in that name he'd wooed and won her and in that name he'd taken her to wife—twice. Even if he did alter his looks in an effort to avoid detection, on no account was he surrendering his identity to a thieving murderer. As the saying went, he'd sooner see Roselli in hell.

The memory of his malevolent double presiding over the press conference rose before Remington's mind's eye, straight dark hair, blue eyes, Irish accent, impeccable tailoring. Unconsciously he bared his teeth in a growl. Don't get too comfortable, boyo, he addressed the picture in his head. I'll be along any day to retrieve what's mine. Then we'll see how I deal with bastards who've made my wife suffer.

His suffering wife, in the meantime, had bestirred herself during his absence, straightening the bed and hauling in the rest of her luggage from the Rabbit. Except it wasn't only her luggage. Amid the growing pile were his cowboy boots and leather jacket. And what was it she was struggling with now? He hurried forward to lend a hand. A portfolio whose shoulder strap was much too long for her-an unwieldy canvas duffel-?

She'd brought along his art supplies.

Dropping to a crouch, he ran his palms over the fine soft leather of his portfolio and thumbed the clasps open. Inside was almost a complete collection of his sketches: works in progress, preliminary studies, signed and completed drawings. The duffel contained the tools she'd given him on his last birthday, as well as the palette knife and tubes of oils he'd acquired at the start of his painting lessons with Gabrieli back in January. Yes, it was a full complement of equipment. Wherever their flight from Lieutenant Jarvis led him and Laura, wherever they ended up, he would be able to go on working.

She'd done it for him. He couldn't quite absorb it at first. With suspicion overshadowing him like a low-hanging thundercloud, and the fate of the agency in the downward balance of the scales, she'd done this for him. What it said about his place in her heart filled him simultaneously with humility and fresh determination to do or die for her, come what may.

She was watching him, a softly dimpled little smile on her lips. "I would've brought the drafting table, too," she said. "But I couldn't figure out how to get it in the front seat."

Mischief danced in her eyes; she hugged him tight when he jumped up and kissed her. So returned to normal did she seem, he was almost persuaded that the calendar had reversed a page while they weren't paying attention. He breathed a fervent "thank you" in her ear, and a soundless one to Providence for engineering the moment.

As they separated, she reached up to caress his stubbly jaw. "Have I told you how much I like you like this?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Poorly groomed? Verging on seedy?"

"Brooding… a little edgy. Very _Miami Vice_."

"Considering where we may be headed, I see it more as _High Plains Drifter_. Clint Eastwood, Universal Pictures, 1973."

He smirked. She laughed back at him. And he thought: I was right. A good night's sleep was what she needed. Another day or two, and she'll be ready to tear Roselli's head off and hand it to him on a platter.

Possibly she would have, had Remington been able to keep _The L.A. Times_ out of her hands.

They'd neither of them eaten since lunch the day before, nor had they had the least appetite for dinner, and by ten o'clock the cabin's bare larder was becoming a serious drawback. But once again, Billie came to their rescue. "I had to go into town anyway," she said as Remington opened the screen door to her and removed a load of groceries from her arms. "And I figured you kids might want to avoid it for the time being. You'll have this place to yourselves all weekend, too, except for me."

Laura turned to her. "Please tell me you didn't."

"Didn't what?" demanded Remington.

"Cancel her bookings so we wouldn't have to worry about other guests recognizing us. You did, didn't you? Oh, Billie…"

Billie grinned. "I'm not saying I didn't, and I'm not saying I did. But if I did, I'd only be returning the favor."

It was an allusion to the origins of their friendship, which had begun with Lou Mackler's plot to smoke out Billie's whereabouts, ostensibly to include her in a "TV Reunion Weekend" segment on _L.A. Live!_, but really with the intent of murdering her. He'd enlisted Windsor Thomas as his unwitting instrument; she had in turn hired Remington and Laura to perform the heavy lifting. In the end the three of them had united in a friendly conspiracy to protect Billie from exposure. Now, through a bizarre twist none of them could've foreseen, the roles were reversed.

"You call it returning the favor, we call it generosity above and beyond the norm," said Remington. He stooped to kiss her on one cheek, then the other. "We're grateful. Thank you."

Amazingly, a fierce tide of crimson was sweeping upward from Billie's neck to the roots of her hair. To cover she quipped to Laura, "He's some charmer, isn't he? Could probably whistle the birds out of the trees if he wanted to, the way that old song says."

"He has his moments," Laura agreed, smiling.

After Billie had gone, the Steeles worked together in the Spartan but adequate kitchenette to unpack the groceries. They found she'd bought enough food to tide them over the weekend, including ingredients for a couple days of hearty breakfasts. "Ah, eggs, bacon _and_ sausage, bless her heart," said Remington. "And tea! Laura, if she was twenty years younger, and I wasn't already irretrievably, eternally smitten, I'd go down on one knee to that woman."

"Obviously the feeling's mutual. I'd be jealous if I didn't have inside knowledge of your aversion to fish, fishing, canoeing, hiking, camping and the woods in general."

"I suppose that would put a damper on the relationship."

He put on the kettle, cracked eggs into a bowl, set a skillet-load of bacon and sausage on a medium flame. More and more the morning was taking on an ordinary feel; the sense of disaster was receding. It was a reaction similar to witnessing a bad accident while driving down the highway: the shock shook your very bones to begin with, lingered a few miles and then faded in proportion to the dwindling of the scene in the rearview mirror. Behind it followed perspective and a modicum of optimism.

The eggs were scrambling nicely. As he poured boiling water into two mugs, he said over his shoulder, "Breakfast in ten minutes, my love. The anticipation puts me in mind of waiting on line at Harrigan's soup kitchen. Nothing like the first hot food in twenty-four hours, eh? And when we've finished we'll see where we are with that to-do list of yours. The substitute for the Rabbit especially. It'll be tricky, given my current popularity with the police, but I've some ideas on how to pull it off."

He might've been alone in the room, it was so quiet. He swung round from the stove. "Laura?"

She didn't answer, and now he could see why: she'd returned to the chair near the window and her chestnut head was bent over…a newspaper?

Yes, that was exactly what it was.

Not for long. Oblivious to his gaze—or too distraught to care—she chose that moment to toss the paper aside. Then, without looking at him, she rose and crossed to the bed. There she lay down with her face buried in the pillow.

It was totally out of character for her. He stood gaping for a full ten seconds before it occurred to him to turn off the burners and find out what had upset her. Of course, part of him was already prepared for what he'd see when he snatched the newspaper from the floor.

The _Times_. Billie must've picked it up in town as a favor to them.

Damn.

Though the mattress dipped beneath him as he settled on its edge, his wife didn't acknowledge his presence by even a twitch of a muscle. "Laura?" he said again.

No reply. He ran a hand over her hair. "Tell me. We'll face it together, whatever it is."

He heard her sigh. "They're completely sold on him," she said, her voice muffled by the pillow. "Roselli. Doesn't matter that every word that comes out of his mouth is a lie. They're eating it up."

"Who is?"

"The _Times_. It gives brand new meaning to the term 'media darling'."

His hand slipped under her hair to caress her nape. "It's one newspaper, Laura. There are plenty of others, radio, television, not to mention the police. And what about the questions he's yet to answer? If he's Remington Steele, where has he been hiding himself for the past five years? How could we take over the agency without his permission? It doesn't make sense."

"Maybe not, but when has that stopped him before? And public opinion's on his side."

"Only because we haven't countered with the truth."

"Which we can't do without admitting you're a fraud, and I'm the one who created you. The _Times _says he's calling for the Licensing Bureau to launch a full investigation. What does that tell you?"

Remington took his time about answering, not because he didn't understand what she was getting at, but because he was reluctant to express it aloud. "That's he's not afraid of them scrutinizing his story. The same way he wasn't when he passed himself off as an Immigration official."

"Exactly."

"So…he's rigged the game before it's even started."

"Was there ever any doubt?" She turned over and looked up at him, her eyes dry but so heavy with misery he almost wished she would let herself cry. "Who is he, Remington?" she whispered. "Who _is_ he?"

"I don't know."

"You know what hurts the most? The pieces of the puzzle have been there all along. His picture in a dead soldier's personnel records. Spying on us as Ross Elliot, security guard. Letters in his apartment addressed to Mr. Niemand. Why didn't I put them together? Why wasn't I paying attention?"

"They aren't the most transparent clues we've ever come across. And it's not as if we didn't have other cases on the front burner. The Eitschl matter, for starters. Ava Rivaro…Anna…Hambeth…"

She shook her head. "I've lost my edge. I don't know when or how, but I've lost it. And we've lost the agency because of it. If I'd only concentrated—sat down and really thought through what he's already done, and what the logical outcome would be, given our phony Steele's history…But I didn't. I wasn't good enough to spot what was staring me in the face. And now it's too late."

Both her words and tone chilled him to the core. He'd never heard such hopelessness from her. It was as if the agency was already pronounced dead, and she was conducting its post mortem.

His disquiet caused him to say more sharply than he'd intended, "Nonsense. We haven't _lost_ the agency, Laura. He's _stolen_ it from us. That's a world of difference."

"Semantics, Mr. Steele. It doesn't change anything." From the way she turned her face into the pillow again, he deduced she was prepared to stay there all day.

Except that he wasn't standing for it, not for a moment, and set himself to rally her. By dint of careful persuasion and an upshift into light-hearted banter, he succeeding in luring her to the kitchen table, where he made sure she ate part of her breakfast. Once she had, and drunk a cup of tea on top of it, her mood brightened perceptibly.

She was also willing to focus on a discussion of their immediate future, as long as it didn't touch on the agency. Most of the ideas were hers, anyway; she'd conceived them en route from Los Angeles to Twin Pines the day before. And she was still refusing to budge on her favorite, enlisting Murphy Michaels as their ally in proving Remington hadn't murdered Windsor Thomas. In her spirited defense of her reasons Remington caught another brief glimpse of the real Laura.

More or less the argument was a re-hash of yesterday's, which had ended in a draw. Now he capitulated, albeit with the worst possible grace. "All right, you win," he said, scowling. "Happy? But don't blame me if it blows up in our faces. And I give you fair warning. If he as much as mentions the episode in the County Museum when it appeared I left you at the mercy of the police so I could abscond with _The Five Nudes of Cairo_, I won't be held responsible for my actions."

There was a wry quirk playing around her mouth, a clue that made him suspect she was resisting the temptation to laugh at him again. "What?" he exclaimed.

"You guys," was all she would say. But it was with a fondness that did a lot to mollify him, though he wasn't about to admit it to her.

With plans for their trip from California to Denver nailed down, their next pressing concern was to find a stand-in for the Rabbit. It wasn't as easy as it seemed at first blush; Remington pointed out the pitfalls represented by their real driver's licenses and registrations in making a purchase, or even driving in general, given his sudden notoriety. Fortunately he knew just the men who could help them out. A single phone call to Los Angeles, and not three hours later two of his shadier acquaintances were pulling up in a black Oldsmobile that had seen better days: the washed-up old con, Packy Cavendish, and eccentric, multi-talented Dwayne "Weasel" Webster.

Packy greeted Laura like an old friend. Weasel, on the other hand, eyed her askance, as he'd done in every encounter they'd had to date. "What's shakin', Cruella?"

Hands on hips, Laura stared right back. "That's Mrs_._ DeVil to you, buster," she said crisply. She gestured towards the Olds. "What's this? Your latest vacation home?"

"Hey, that's very humorous. Heh heh." By now they'd filed into the cabin. "Yo, Steele. You never told me your old lady's a comedian."

Filling a quartet of glasses at the kitchen tap, Remington glanced over his shoulder. "Careful, mate. Mrs. Steele objects to demeaning nicknames. If you've any expectation of a future Mrs. Weasel and assorted junior Weasels, I'd especially advise you to avoid the term 'little woman' at all costs."

"It makes me cranky. You wouldn't want to make me cranky, would you?" Laura added.

Weasel let loose with an expletive. "Dwayne!" Packy scolded him. "Language! There's a lady present."

Realizing he was outnumbered, Weasel decided the wiser course was to sit at the kitchen table and get down to business. "So what are we talkin' here?"

Remington explained their situation and the need for fake IDs. He'd guessed that Weasel and Packy, with their unpredictable, vagabond lives, hadn't watched the press conference or read the morning papers. He was right. But from them he learned that the telegraph lines that bound and connected the subterranean world they inhabited were already bristling with details of Roselli's treachery and Windsor's murder.

Both men scoffed at the idea that Remington was the killer. "There's no denying you're a man of parts, Mick," Packy said. "But shooting a defenseless woman? Frankly, I can't see you doing it. Neither can anyone else."

'Nobody knows who really whacked her off, though," said Weasel. "Or if they do they ain't talking."

A troubled frown was wrinkling Packy's grizzled brows, Remington noticed. "Something the matter?"

Packy hesitated. "It might be nothing. But I'm glad you're leaving town. The sooner the better. You'll be safer away, I think, you and your little bride."

"Safer?" Laura said. A contrast to her sparring with Weasel: she didn't take offense to Packy's reference to 'the little bride'.

"Why, what have you heard?" Remington asked him.

"There's a man looking for you. Or so I'm told. Asking who's pals with you, does anyone know your usual hideouts. Money's changed hands. There are those who'd give you up for less than the price of a pack of cigarettes if they had information to trade."

"It's probably the police," said Laura. "They were on the case by three o'clock yesterday afternoon. Wouldn't you agree-" she paused for emphasis "—Dwayne?"

This time Weasel refused to rise to the bait. "You got me."

"It's not the police," said Packy. "From your description, I think he must be the man who's pretending to be you. They say he could be your twin."

Conversation stuttered to a halt. With an icy prickle raising the hair on his scalp, Remington gazed across at Laura, and saw his fear reflected in her eyes. They had reason to be frightened. The identity of their pursuer was beyond a doubt. With Roselli on their trail, the stakes had risen considerably.

And become infinitely deadlier.

One thing was certain. The peace and security the Steeles had found in Twin Pines was not only illusory, but fleeting. There was no time to waste in executing their flight. Not if they meant to escape with their lives, there wasn't.

Laura was on the same wavelength, Remington discovered after Packy and Weasel had gone. They would return sometime on Sunday with two fake driver's licenses and registrations apiece for each of the Steeles. The door had no sooner closed behind them than she'd jumped up to pace the cabin, rubbing her upper arms as if she were cold. It wasn't a stretch to surmise the news about Roselli had caused the chill.

"We need to get out of here, and fast," she said. "Tomorrow, if we can swing it."

For lack of anything else to do, Remington had carried the glasses to the sink and begun the washing up. Now he shut off the tap and leaned back against the counter to watch her. "I doubt we'll be able to find a car on such short notice."

"Then we'll have to make do with the Rabbit. It was a stupid idea anyway."

"And if the police have issued an APB? Including a description of the car we're driving? We'd never reach Death Valley, let alone the Nevada border."

"You're right—you're right. I don't know what I was thinking." Raising both hands, she pressed her hair away from her forehead. "He's so much farther ahead of the game than we are, it's scary. Poking around your old haunts. Passing out bribes. What possessed him to start the hunt there in the first place?"

The question had been nagging him, too. Even though it was unsatisfactory, he presented her with the solitary explanation he'd come up with. "No doubt he has resources we can't begin to imagine. Don't forget he's been plotting this since as far back as the beginning of July."

"But why come after us at all? It's not like we're any threat to him. He's seen to that."

Remington stared at her in surprise. Did she really not grasp the implications? Or was she denying the obvious—an attitude as unlike her as possibly could be? The latter, he decided. He had to clamp down hard on the urge to take her by the shoulders and demand, who are you, and what have you done with my wife?

Instead he said, "Do you have to ask?"

She let a second or two pass and then dropped her eyes. "Eliminating the competition. And potential witnesses."

"How better to ensure our silence than to dispatch us personally, eh?"

He'd spoken in blunt terms, without sugarcoating, because that was how he and Laura operated while on the job or coping with crises. Scornful of euphemism and condescension to so-called feminine weakness, she took the truth the way she did her Scotch: neat. And she'd taught him to follow her lead.

Bad move.

Immediately she turned to him he saw proof of his blunder. Her face was drained of color, her eyes wide, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, hands cupping her elbows. In her posture he thought he recognized the signs of incipient panic.

She said: "In that case, we certainly picked the wrong week to bury ourselves in the sticks. No one except Billie for miles around…the nearest police station two towns away…We couldn't have made better sitting ducks of ourselves if we tried."

"Laura-" he replied, and beckoned, a wordless gesture that meant, 'come here'. But she was moving him past him too rapidly—or too enmeshed in private terrors—to pay attention.

"This cabin is about as secure as a house of cards," she continued; her voice was more tightly wound than ever. "I don't know why I didn't realize it until now. Have you tried picking the locks, Mr. Steele? I'm sure it's easy as pie. One pass with a credit card would do the trick. And what do you want to bet you could pop the screens without a screwdriver?"

"Aren't you getting just a little carried away?"

"I don't know. Am I?" The laugh she gave was brittle and mirthless. "You heard Packy. Roselli's looking for us and he means business. For all we know he's already picked up the scent. Maybe he's already here. Think about it…He could be a few yards away—hiding in the woods—how could we tell? What if he is? What if he's out there, watching…waiting like he always does-?"

By this point she was in definite free fall; another nudge in the wrong direction, and she'd have crossed the line into full-blown hysteria. For a bewildering, emotionally chaotic moment he seemed poised to join her. It was the unprecedented spectacle of a panic-stricken Laura that was pushing him toward the edge. _She_ was the level-headed one, damn it, the calm, collected center on whom he relied. Watching her fall apart was tantamount to his world buckling and crumbling beneath his feet. And if she became totally undone, who would help him piece gather up the broken pieces and rebuild?

He had to literally, physically shake himself to regain some shred of composure. Rein it in, Steele, he thought. She needs you.

If any admonishment could put the heart and spine back in him, it was that. In two long strides he was at her side. Enfolding her from behind robbed her of momentum, he found, though it did nothing to tame her resistance. But there was another solution to try: laying his face against her hair, lips close to her ear. "Hey. Hey. Hey," he whispered. "I've got you. It's okay…"

The combination worked. He felt the tension slowly leave her as he rocked her. She even allowed herself to relax against him and clasp his hands.

Far too soon for his taste, and unlike the previous night, she broke from his embrace. "All right. I'm all right."

"Are you?"

"Sure." Lightly she touched her fingertips to his cheek. "I'm over it. You can stop worrying."

As well to tell him to stop breathing, but never mind. "You're giving him exactly what he wants, you know, letting him get to you like this. He's not invincible. Don't invest him with more power than he actually has."

Quick to grasp the reference, she regarded him with a faint smile. "Using my own words against me, Mr. Steele?"

"Indeed I am. Weren't they true in September, when I couldn't pay him what he deserves for hurting you?"

"Of course they were."

"Then they're true now. Even so, there's something I want you to consider. Put your scruples aside and hear me out til I'm through. Our lives may depend on it, I think."

He was verging dangerously near on hyperbole, and knew it; he half-expected her to brush him off with a breezy rejoinder. But the gaze she fixed on him lost nothing of its seriousness. "Okay," she said.

"He's been savage in pursuing us. Two innocent women are dead because of it. There's no question he's playing to win, Laura. If we come up against him again…_when_ we come against him…we play him the same way. No mercy, no quarter. And shoot to kill."

His voice grated in the cozy little cabin. To his own ears it sounded impossibly harsh. Yet it held only the merest suggestion of the depths Roselli inspired in him: the loathing and fury, the unforgiveness and desire for vengeance.

A moment later he heard it again. It was Laura echoing him, equally implacable, full of equal hatred.

"You're right. We shoot to kill," she said.

* * *

Throughout the rest of the afternoon and the evening that followed, he maintained an unobtrusive but ceaseless vigilance over her. She gave him no cause for fresh anxiety, however. As for the anxiety he already harbored…well, that was a cat of a different color.

At seven-thirty they settled gingerly in front of _Spotlight News_' nightly broadcast. The lead story was the mystery surrounding Remington Steele Investigations; a full ten minutes of air time was devoted to updates. The newly revealed Steele had proven frustratingly unavailable for comment. A hotshot whistleblower of a reporter presented the holes in the old Steele's bio, probably borrowing heavily from Windsor's research. A profile of Laura, faithful associate, Steele's wife, cast her in a distinctly unflattering light. B-roll of the office from the vantage point of the corridor showed a reception area empty of clients and Mildred alike.

In a fifteen-second on camera segment Lieutenant Jarvis confirmed the link between Laura and Remington's disappearance to Windsor Thomas's murder. "We're not saying he's the killer, but every day he's missing makes it more and more likely. Meanwhile we're pooling our resources with the FBI to find him as soon as possible.

Windsor's funeral was scheduled for the following Monday. The newscast wrapped up with a retrospective of her work for _Spotlight News_.

As the opening theme of _Jeopardy_! began, Remington turned suddenly to Laura. "It's just hit me. They haven't aired Windsor's story, today or yesterday. Not that I'm not profoundly grateful for the lapse. But why ignore a sure ratings bonanza?"

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but my guess is Jarvis confiscated the tapes and any background material. Evidence. If she knew what we think she did, he's probably built his whole case around them." His alarm must have written itself on his face, for she squeezed his hand. "Sorry."

At nine o'clock Mildred rang Billie's to report on developments at the office. It wasn't a pretty tale. Whispers and squint-eyed glances had tracked her progress that morning through the downstairs lobby all the way up in the elevator. The only phone calls were from the media. She received no visitors save for increasingly intrusive reporters, against whom she'd finally locked the doors. Security had refused to come to her aid. There was no sign of Roselli.

Finally two guests stopped by not long before close of business. The first was a process server bearing a court order filed by the California Licensing Bureau. Remington Steele Investigations and its owner, Laura Holt, were enjoined forthwith to cease and desist from all business activity pending a formal hearing, including cases currently in progress. Miss Holt's investigator's license was suspended until further notice. In forty-eight hours the office would be sealed by a U.S. marshal in advance of the arrival of the licensing bureau's disciplinary team. That was okay; Mildred had already spirited out the papers Mrs. Steele had asked for and forwarded them to Denver.

"And the second guest?" asked Remington, once the three of them had exhausted the initial outpouring of grief and indignation at the bureau's decision and Roselli's role in it.

"Gave his name as David Flannery. That's about all he gave."

"Reporter?"

"He says not. He wants to help, and you should contact him. Quote, 'there's not a moment to lose'. Unquote."

Remington snorted. "I'm painfully familiar with the sort of help he's offering, thank you very much. Stonewall him, Mildred. He's up to no good. I guarantee it."

At last the Steeles wended their weary way to bed. Remington got in first. Laura curled up against him, girlish in her pajamas, small and soft and sweet-smelling. Defenseless, as he'd thought months ago, watching her sleep in a hospital bed at l'Hôpital Saint-Sauveur, Menton. Vulnerable. Not at all herself.

He wondered whether he had what it would take to get her through this, to keep her safe.

And that was the end of their first day in exile from their real life.

TO BE CONTINUED


	3. PART I: Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"Hey, kids, got a minute?" Billie called through the screened door of the Steeles' cabin. "There's something I need to show you."

It was Monday morning—the end, thank goodness, of a strange, disjointed, aimless weekend. With their departure for Denver on hold, a full forty-eight hours had stretched before the Steeles with nothing to do and nowhere to be. For Remington it was a reminder of his pre-Steele self, when 'routine' was a word rarely in his vocabulary, let alone a factor in the ordering of his days. Only now the expression that came to mind was 'loose ends'. Unmoored. Adrift. Not an entirely unpleasant sensation, but one whose temptations to idleness and dissipation he was more inclined to resist than he had in the past.

Laura was worse off by far than he. For practically the first time since he'd met her, she'd no tasks to organize, no lists to tick off, no goals to accomplish. Where did it go, that awesome energy, when deprived of its usual outlet? Inward, he feared, to feed a self-perpetuating loop in which she endlessly analyzed and re-analyzed the loss of the agency and her fault in it. It was the best explanation he could think of for her silences, which were both frequent and prolonged.

At first, still ignorant of the change events had wrought in her, he'd totally mistaken the character of those silences. A sign that she was incubating a plan, he thought they were. Yes, they could certainly use one of Laura's plans about now: a marvel of breathtaking ingenuity and daring that would clear him of Windsor's murder, reveal Roselli as the black-hearted villain he actually was, secure the agency and restore their reputation in one fell swoop. It went without saying she would emerge from the shell into which she'd retreated to put it into action.

Which side of her would come uppermost in the struggle? Anticipation had filled him as he contemplated the question. The passionate little fury who'd refused to rest until she'd brought the creeps who staffed the Enterprow Foundation to justice for blowing up her house? The canny sleuth who hadn't gone off the deep end when it seemed he'd signed away the agency in a poker game, but instead recognized and thwarted the clever scheme their former wimp lawyer, Reuben Saltzman, had cooked up to hoodwink them out of it? A composite of the two? Whichever it was, he would follow her into battle the way he always did, full of wonder and admiration, confident in her capable leadership.

Only by slow, painful degrees had the truth begun to sink in.

On Saturday she said: "If I hadn't led him on, none of this would've happened."

Engrossed in _The Blue Dahlia, _which he hadn't seen in years, Remington might legitimately have been forgiven for not according the remark the attention it deserved. "Mm?" he replied.

"Roselli. If I hadn't led him on…used him to make you jealous…none of this would've happened."

That penetrated. Swiftly he glanced up from the TV. "We've been through this, haven't we? Months ago."

What he meant was, they'd discussed and dismissed as fallacy the notion that Roselli had ever pursued her with genuine romantic intent. He'd sued for her affections, and then acted the rejected suitor, for the express purpose of provoking Remington into…something. Why second guess his motivations—and their judgment—now?

Remington put the question to her point blank.

"I'm not," she said. "But I should've figured it out a lot sooner than I did. The problem was I let the personal get in the way of the professional. And it blinded me to what he really is. Or maybe…maybe I did sense it and overlooked it, because he was there, and convenient, and I was so focused on setting you off, nothing was going to stand in my way." She paused. "Stupidity or willful negligence. I don't know which is worse."

That wasn't his recollection of events; he made sure she knew it. "You weren't exactly thinking clearly at the time," he added. "Courtesy of yours truly. If we're in the mood to parcel out blame, let's see that I shoulder my fair share."

"Don't," she said softly. "Don't try and whitewash it for me. You can't, anyway. It's the truth, and I need to face it." And she lapsed into introspection again.

On Sunday morning he was roused early by her touch on his shoulder. "I'll be back in a little while," she said.

He had to wait for his brain to catch up with the single bleary eye he opened, but finally it registered the jogging gear she was wearing. The sight was as potent as a dash of cold water in the face in terms of waking him the rest way. "You're going for a run? Alone?"

"I can't stand being cooped up here one more second. I need some air…and time to think…"

It seemed to him she'd done little else of late, but he refrained from comment. The inconsistency in her behavior was the more pressing issue anyway. "Are you sure that's a good idea, considering?"

"You mean Roselli could be out there?" She shrugged. "I'll take my chances."

"Oh, no, you don't. Give me a minute and I'll come with you."

Plainly she hadn't reckoned on his tumbling out of bed with a speed he was rarely capable of at that hour. And as he hurried into a pair of jeans and laced up his track shoes, she looked on with frank displeasure. "I'll be fine. You don't have to babysit me."

"Rest assured, babysitting is the furthest thing from my mind."

"You won't be able to keep up."

"That's what I love about you, Mrs. Steele. Your unsinkable confidence in my ability to rise to a challenge." His shirt half unbuttoned, he motioned with a flourish for her to precede him. "Shall we?"

They went out together into the cool, pine-scented morning. The route she'd chosen bordered the road that led to the next town; they approached it mostly in silence, Laura stalking ahead. He wasn't sure if it was because she'd decided she wasn't speaking to him or because she was absorbed in mental preparation for her first workout in over a week.

When they arrived at their destination, she threw a swift glance back at him. "Ready to eat my dust?"

"By all means, lead the way, my love."

She did, in a burst of speed that suggested a caged bird gaining its freedom. A long-legged field darter, perhaps. He smiled inwardly at the metaphor and the associations with the past it conjured up as he set off in her wake.

For the first quarter of an hour or thereabouts he managed to match her pace. He wasn't much of an endurance runner, never had been, so it was a foregone conclusion that he would eventually fall behind. But even after he was forced to slow to a brisk walk, he continued to trail Laura doggedly, determined to keep her in sight.

And content at the same time merely to watch her. Despite the weight of trouble she was carrying, she was fleet and graceful as always; he would never tire of the contrasts her running form represented, the juxtaposition of elegance and delicacy over against strength and resiliency. It made him wish he'd a camera with him. Or, even better, his sketchbook and pencil. Although…it went without saying that capturing her in flight like this would represent an entirely new challenge for him. How did one go about it, he wondered, rendering the impression of speed and motion in crayon or oils while preserving the purity of line-?

The sound of a car engine, amplified by the early morning quiet, insinuated itself into his reverie without actually interrupting it. Idly he recognized that it was heading towards them from the north. They would see it well before its driver spotted them.

Apparently Laura didn't share his unconcern. She'd frozen in a listening posture at the side of the road. Over her shoulder she turned to him the same scared little face as yesterday. Then she broke for the cover of the tree line.

He didn't draw a breath, didn't blink, didn't think, just plunged across the distance—it was no more than a hundred yards—that separated them. As he did, the car sailed placidly by. The man at the wheel was white-haired and elderly and nothing to do with them.

"All right, false alarm," Remington panted, grabbing Laura's hand. "Come on. It's okay."

Her face was flushed scarlet, but not, unless he was greatly mistaken, from exertion. ""Where are we going?" she said.

"Back to the cabin. I think you've had enough for today, don't you?"

"I'm not through with my workout." She pulled away from him.

"But I thought-"

"What?" She'd begun to lengthen her stride, but not before he got a good look at the angle of her jaw. "You thought what? That I'm ready to turn tail and scamper back to safety? That I want to spend another day cowering inside four walls? Think again, Mr. Steele."

This time it was more of a struggle to stay with her; his breath was coming in short puffs. "Yes, all right, but wait up, would you?"

"Oh, will you just stop it?" she snapped back at him. "Stop _hovering_ over me!"

He halted in his tracks. She ran on without him. Nor did she glance around to see where he'd got to.

That hurt. So had her little outburst; he was in no mood to deny it. Fuming, he gazed after her retreating figure. She was perfectly capable of taking care of herself, was she? And better off without him? Splendid. Let her have at it. He would return to the cabin without her. There were millions of other things he'd rather be doing than chasing all over the countryside at her heels—an exercise in pointlessness if ever there was one. He was washing his hands of the thankless task of babysitter for good.

Or perhaps not. For she was slowing the pace…coming to halt. Twenty seconds more, and she'd swung around and was making her way back up the path.

It didn't take her long. Not a jot of his annoyance dissipated in the interval, despite the fact that he held an imaginary exchange with her in which he had his say and she humbly asked his pardon. Leaning against a tree, arms folded, he waited as she headed towards him, and fell in beside her without a word.

She was as little inclined to speak as he was, he discovered. Good thing he'd elicited those apologies from the Laura of his fancy. His real wife would sooner have pulled out her thumbnails with a pair of pliers than admitted she was in the wrong and sorry for it.

He said: "Mind telling me what that was all about?"

Her eyes flicked up to his and then away. "I'm not a coward, Remington," she said.

"Nobody said you were." She didn't respond, but it didn't signify. Suddenly the entire episode—her insistence on jogging, the moment she'd bolted for the trees, her shame-faced expression afterward-made sense to him. "Ah, I see. That's what we're doing out here? Proving it?"

"Aren't you the one who said I shouldn't let him…Roselli…get to me? I'm taking your advice."

"I didn't mean it to be a dare, Laura."

"No. But maybe I decided to dare myself. Maybe I thought it was what I needed."

"But it didn't work out quite the way you hoped."

"I was fine until that car came along. It just-well, you saw what happened. Not my most impressive performance."

She was gripping her arms above each elbow, a gesture he was beginning to recognize. It softened what remained of his irritation. "Nothing to be ashamed of," he said. "It's only natural to be afraid. Healthy, too. You of all people should know it's what you do with the fear that matters."

"Well, outrunning it didn't work. Got any other suggestions?"

"Would you entertain them if I did? Seriously, I mean?"

"Touché." Self-mocking, she smiled up at him. "Sometimes it's scary, how well you really do know me."

It was as close to an apology as she was likely to get. It was also the death of that flicker of defiance. By the time they returned to the cabin, sad resignation had sheathed her once again. And none of the old tricks he'd perfected for drawing her out of herself—humor, needling her into an argument, letting slip a heretofore unrevealed nugget of his mysterious past—were proof against it. She was listless and remote, unreachable.

It hadn't helped that the news from Los Angeles continued uniformly bad. Just when the initial furor seemed to be dying down, the Sunday _Times_ had stirred the pot with a front-page screed that purported to expose cases mishandled by Remington Steele Investigations over the years. According to Mildred, it was heavily subjective, light on facts and unbalanced, since it mentioned none of their extraordinary successes. And it included some surprising names among its on-the-record sources.

"Bing Perret?" Remington had exclaimed. "But I thought he liked us! Considering we shot his double-dealing, two-faced rival out of the water, recovered the stolen product, saved his father's reputation as the King of Caviar _and_ kept his own ample backside out of the sling. He should be thanking us on his knees!"

"Assuming he could get down on them in the first place," Laura had commented dryly as she listened in.

"He says we were"—here Mildred had quoted directly from the article—" 'disorganized, unprofessional and unscrupulous in charging personal fees to my account. When I expressed misgivings, they brushed me off with a pat on the head…Looking back I have to say if I hadn't insisted on supervising every step of the investigation, it would've ended in disaster.' Sorry, chief. And Heather Saint-Germaine? From the Chef Gaston commercials? She says-"

Worried that Laura's stoic mask was fraying around the edges, he'd cut the flow of revelation. "Thank you, Mildred, we're getting the gist." The proverbial rats and sinking ship, he added silently. For an instant he fantasized about capturing the image on paper, where he could render the cartoon rodents with appropriate features: Bing Perret, Heather Saint-Germaine, Alf Nussman, Brenda Flowers, Richard Laidlaw …

He'd heaved a sigh then and run a hand back through his hair. As soothing to his feelings as it might have been, caricaturing the ingrates who'd back-stabbed him and Laura, he had to admit it wouldn't solve a thing. What they needed instead was a spot of unadulterated good news for a change, a peg to hang their hopes on, a rescue raft that would prevent Laura from sinking farther into the slough of despond.

Billie's Monday morning surprise—the gift of what they found out later was a brand new, top-of-the-line Fleetwood Class A motorhome-fit the bill nicely.

"See what you think," she said, gesturing towards it as they joined her in the parking lot in response to her call.

Confused but game, they did as she asked. It was an imposing vehicle, massive yet sleek, its chrome and pearl-gray paint fresh and gleaming. Compared to the elderly Winnebago Mildred hired for them for use in a case several years ago, it was positively palatial.

Billie was watching them with her head on one side. "Like it?"

"It's wonderful," said Laura.

"Very impressive, indeed," agreed Remington.

"It's yours." With an easy motion of the wrist that would've done the denizens of the Golden Dugout Baseball Camp proud, Billie tossed a ring of keys to him.

The dumbstruck Steeles gaped. First to recover, Laura stammered, "Oh, no…this is too much. We couldn't possibly accept-"

"—a gift this size," Remington finished in unison with her.

Billie was unfazed. "I figured you'd say that. That's why I'm selling it to you. See? Here's the bill of sale. Easy terms. Cash up front."

They'd barely bent together over the paper she handed them before they were raising their heads to look at her again. "One dollar?" Remington asked.

"What can I say? You caught me on a good day." Intercepting the look that passed between the Steeles, Billie became serious. "I bet I can tell what you're thinking. 'How can she afford it?' Am I right?"

Laura's expressive glance around at the cabins was as good as a verbal reply.

"Yeah…I thought so," Billie went on. "Look, don't let this get-up fool you. I'm loaded. Even Jake Slater's blackmail couldn't put a dent in my bank account."

Laura was about to offer another objection; this time Billie pre-empted her. "Make an old lady who has too much money and no one to spend it on happy. Take it, and welcome."

It seemed only natural that they should move into a three-way hug while the Steeles poured out their gratitude. Billie smiled and patted Laura's cheek and reached up to pinch Remington's chin. "Go on in, look around. You won't be disappointed."

They weren't. And it wasn't just because the interior was in a class apart from the orange shag carpet and nylon room dividers they remembered from the Winnebago. From the owners' manual they learned that thanks to its high-capacity water tank and generator, the Fleetwood could be operated as a self-sufficient domicile for days on end. More than a camper, it was truly a home on wheels.

Exploring the cunningly outfitted galley—oak veneer floor, oak cabinets, built-in microwave and coffee-maker—Remington paused and gazed across at Laura. "What do you think?"

"It's the same principle as that time we transported Chris and Angel Gallen to Phoenix. Mobile and self-contained. No need to stop at motels or too many campgrounds, which mean less risk we'll be recognized. I like it." She turned from her inspection of the bedroom and moved into the galley. "We're only borrowing it, though. Someday…when this is all over…we'll try and make Billie understand."

"My thoughts exactly. In the meantime, she's accomplished a feat I'd have thought impossible, given the hatchet job the paper did on us this morning."

"What's that?"

"Restored my faith in the human race. Or at least in the old adage 'one good turn deserves another'."

While he spoke he'd slipped his arms around her and was resting his chin on the top of her head. Any farther away, and he'd have missed the tremor borne of concealed emotion in her low voice.

"Me, too, Mr. Steele," she said. "Me, too."

* * *

By nightfall they'd made it halfway to the California border.

It had taken less than an hour to prepare for their departure from Twin Pines, pack their bags, stow the lot in the Fleetwood and erase all signs of their habitation from the cabin. Last of all they'd turned over a set of the Rabbit's keys to Billie. An acquaintance of hers had agreed to store it in an old barn on his property.

"Take care of yourselves," she'd said, bestowing a final hug on each of the Steeles in turn. "And don't forget to keep in touch."

Once again Remington had kissed her European-fashion on both cheeks. "This isn't good-bye. Merely _au revoir_, as the French would have it. Til we meet again." It was as much a promise to himself as it was to Billie that he and Laura would survive this in one piece.

Laura climbed into the RV's passenger seat. He got behind the wheel. "Here we are," he said, letting the engine idle for a moment. "Any final thoughts before we get underway?"

"One. I love you, Remington Steele."

He'd smiled, and shifted the Fleetwood into drive.

Their main consideration when plotting their route to Denver had been avoiding the interstate, and the combination of back roads and the Fleetwood's weight slowed them down more than he'd have liked. Even so, he experienced a rush of adrenalin whose intensity increased in proportion to the number of miles that dropped behind them. It was as odd as it was unlooked-for; he wasn't sure what to make of it.

Then it hit him. It was the old ingrained response to moving on, casting off one identity for another, setting his sights, so to speak, on another shore. The nomad's life was what he knew best, after all. Small wonder he should fall into its rhythms so quickly. Besides, part of him had been hankering for freedom since the moment he'd run to earth in Twin Pines. It hadn't set well with his manhood, that ineffectual skulking while Roselli played havoc with their lives. On the open road he felt himself again, his powers recovered, equal to whatever Roselli might have in store.

Circumstances seemed to be running in his and Laura's favor, too. After an uneventful two hundred miles or so, they crossed the line between Los Angeles and Inyo Counties—a geographical boundary that seemed nevertheless to promise greater safety and anonymity. Beyond the jurisdiction of the LAPD, the editorial reach of the _Times_ and the _Trib_, the Steeles could take a chance on showing themselves in public.

In a little town east of the Inyo line they did just that, stopping for provisions at the grocery, the service station and the hardware-cum-party store-cum pharmacy. Not only did they not attract undue attention, no one spared them a second glance beyond what was necessary to transact their business. Either the storekeepers were an incurious bunch by nature, or the tourist trade had inured them to strangers, given the town's proximity to Death Valley.

"That was easier than I expected," Laura remarked as they pulled back out onto the road. He didn't think he was imagining that the worried frown she'd worn most of the day was less pronounced.

At dusk they set up camp in the parking lot of a church on the eastern outskirts of Lone Pine. Darkness descended swiftly on the California desert; it brought home to them that theirs were the sole lights that showed for miles around. The Fleetwood seemed about as sturdy as an eggshell in the midst of that lonely vastness. But, unlike the woods of Twin Pines, at least they could see the enemy coming.

They locked the doors, closed the blinds, lit the lamps and prepared a simple dinner. The unfamiliar surroundings coupled with the confined space rendered them awkward and a little uncomfortable with one another. Or perhaps it was Laura's tension, unexpressed but keenly observed, evident in her silences, her abstraction, the persistent shadow in the beloved dark eyes.

Well, he believed he had the remedy for that. "Come here," he said later, reaching for her as she slid into her side of the strange new bed. "We'll give this room a proper christening, eh?"

It wasn't comfort sex, not exactly. But he did take it slow in the beginning, stroking and nuzzling her, murmuring softly in her ear, kissing her in the ways and places she loved best while he undressed her with tender, leisurely hands. Heedless of his own pleasure, he was deliberately beguiling her with physical sensation in the hope it would relieve her of the terrible burden she was carrying, however briefly.

He'd made the right choice. Little by little it was having an effect. She was smiling; the light he'd so longed to glimpse was sparkling in her eyes. And then, naked in his arms, she was every inch his Laura again, open and uninhibited and passionate, the lovely girl who'd so thoroughly besotted him from the first second he'd held her this way, and whose enchantment had only increased over the months they'd been together.

But when he woke in the night, she was no longer beside him.

Of course she hadn't gone far. It was easy to locate her, huddled in her dressing gown on the bottom step of the Fleetwood's open side door. He took a seat just above her; she moved over to make room for him and leaned her head against his knee. "Starlight," she said. "It looks so different out here."

Quietly he pointed pictures in the sky out to her. "Andromeda…Perseus. Orion. The Twins. Ursa Major, of course, and the Plough. And see there? That's Polaris. The North Star."

"I didn't know you knew the constellations."

"Comes in handy when you're in the middle of the Mediterranean with a cargo of contraband and the navigational equipment breaks down."

Time passed in which neither of them spoke. The she stirred slightly and sighed. "I miss it, Remington. I miss our home."

The pathos was unintentional. Love and pity smote his heart. He never could resist her beautiful hair at moments like these; his hand drifted down to it now. "I know you do."

"But you don't, do you. Miss it, I mean. Or not in the same way."

Astonishing: though he hadn't said a word, she'd somehow picked up on the exhilaration their road odyssey had kindled in him. Then again, perhaps it wasn't so astonishing, given her constant claim that she could read him like a book. Someday he might even be forced to admit her assertion was grounded in the truth.

Hunting for an honest answer, he let silence stretch out between them. "I'll always be grateful to Patsy for leaving the house to me," he said at last. "And it's proud I was to be able to give my wife a home for a change. But it's what went on between the four walls that counts. Anywhere would've done for me, as long as we're together. As I've told you before."

She'd tipped her head back and was wrinkling her nose at him. "What is it?" he demanded.

"Next you'll be telling me I'm your home, or home is wherever I am, or something."

"Don't be absurd, Laura. Surely you know me too well to expect I'd insult your intelligence with that sort of sentimental rot."

She laughed. "Thank goodness. I was starting to worry you'd gone soft on me."

"Perish the thought. But sentimental's one thing. Sentiment's quite another. And not always bad, I'm beginning to learn."

"No?"

"No. Take this, for example." He drew in a deep breath. "You couldn't be my home because you're part of me, Laura. The best part, I should add. Nothing's any good without you. _I'm_ no good without you. I'd be a half a man…living half a life."

It was her turn to reach for him, her kiss cutting his speech short before it could take off into full flight. Probably it was the saving of him. There were some things a man ought to keep to himself, private and personal, no matter how mad he was for his wife.

For what he hadn't said was this: That she was his moral compass and his anchor. That her well-being was the mission that drove him. Roselli's gifted malevolence had robbed her of her will to fight, had it? Well, then, _he_ would be her champion, fight the battles in her stead, and win back everything they'd lost, especially the home she was grieving for.

Or die in the attempt.

* * *

Finally, three hundred and nine hours, one thousand one hundred ninety-five miles later: Denver.

The previous afternoon he'd let Laura off at a phone box outside of Grand Junction so she could ring ahead to tell Murphy they were coming. She'd slammed the door behind her a shade harder than was needful on her return to the RV.

"Now what?" Remington had asked.

"He's already heard the whole story. Every gory detail."

"Who would've told him?"

"Who else? Our good friends from Havenhurst. He's kept in touch with a lot of them. Apparently Sandy Maxwell called him Thursday night to gloat." The bitterness in her voice was unmistakable.

Colorado in general had impressed him with the rugged gorgeousness of its vistas on his first visit to Aspen several years ago; it could even hold its own, he'd thought, against the grandeur of the Alps. Denver was no exception. Murphy could hardly be blamed for opting to return here in search of the opportunities Los Angeles had seemed to deny him. The bigger puzzle might be, why had he traded his hometown for L.A. in the first place?

The closer they got to Murphy's address, the larger the proportions the paradox assumed. The Michaels lived in what Laura called a subdivision, an enclave that fairly shouted newness and serious money. Winding drives meandered through it, and its sizable houses were set well back from the road and some distance from their neighbors.

Remington raised an eyebrow at the sight. "He's done well for himself, obviously."

"I'll say. Good for him. He deserves it."

Parked, the Fleetwood loomed conspicuous even in the Michaels' long driveway. On the plus side, there were no neighbors near enough to gawk. The eagerness with which Laura hopped out of the cab nettled him a bit, but she removed the sting by coming around to his side to wait for him. Fleetingly he debated taking her hand as they proceeded up the front walk. Too blatant a gesture; he dismissed the idea.

The necessity of knocking was removed because Murphy had opened the door to monitor their approach. Ignoring Remington completely, he captured Laura in a bear hug she reciprocated with enthusiasm. "Hey, partner," he said, and squeezed her hard, and released her.

Now it was up to Remington. Conscious of two pairs of eyes on him—Laura's pleading, Murphy's decidedly hostile-he stepped forward with his hand out, a smile that had more in common with a grimace stiff on his lips. "Well, Murphy, old man. It's been a long time-"

Instinct warned him a fraction of a second beforehand that the punch was coming, Murphy's right fist headed for his stomach. Automatically, almost contemptuously, he blocked the blow.

It was the simultaneous left to the jaw that staggered him and brought him down.

And there it was, his welcome to Denver and the man who was meant to save his bacon: himself, sprawled in an ignominious heap on Murphy Michaels' doorstep; Laura's eyes widened in shock; and Murphy roaring with a belligerence worthy of an Irishman, "What'd I say, Steele? Huh? What'd I say? Take care of her-! Make her happy-! Nice going, pal. How's it feel to be the guy who ruined Laura Holt?"

TO BE CONTINUED


	4. PART I: Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The sound of bone impacting on bone, as well as the spectacle of her husband knocked off his feet, produced a reaction that none of Roselli's depredations or their horrible consequences had been able to thus far: they sparked Laura's ire.

"Damn it, Murphy! That was out of line!" she exploded. Dropping to her knees next to Remington, she took his face in her hands. "Let me see this." When he winced and pulled away from her, she glared up at Murphy. "What's gotten into you?"

Murphy looked as unremorseful as it was possible to be. "He had it coming, Laura."

"Nothing's gotten into him," said Remington. "Nothing new, at any rate. He simply saw his chance to do what he's been waiting to for years."

His tone was mild, he was even wearing a faint smile, but he didn't fool Laura for a second. The blazing blue eyes were the tip-off.

"Isn't that right, Murphy?" he added, rising to face their former colleague.

"Yeah, that's right. Felt damn good, too."

"Glad I could oblige. I suggest you savor the moment. You won't get another."

"You always did talk a good game, tough guy."

"Think so? Care to put me to the test?"

By now they were measuring each other's capabilities in that way men do; if they were dogs they would've been stiff-legged, hackles raised, and snarling. Enough was enough, thought Laura. "Stop it, both of you," she said.

The tone of command was one she was accustomed to use in the old dynamic where she was the boss and they were her employees. Wonder of wonders, it did the trick. They subsided into their respective corners, chastened on the surface, but with the promise of a renewal of hostilities at some future date lurking in their body language.

Feeling like a lion tamer with two especially fractious beasts in her charge, she said, "Murph, is it all right if we come in? We're pretty sure no one's picked up our trail, but an ounce of prevention-"

"I know, I know." He swung the door wide. "It's worth a pound of cure."

The Steeles followed him into the house. It had the flavor of a rambling Western lodge, with exposed beams above and wide plank floors underfoot. In the sunken living room, which took up a full third of the ground level, a fire was burning low on the fieldstone hearth. Ceiling-height windows overlooked a belt of evergreens behind the house and afforded a glimpse of the distant foothills of the Rockies.

Laura wasn't sure in what context she'd imagined Murphy, but it wasn't this. Sinking into a deep, comfortable sofa at Remington's side, she noted the stylish touches in the room, the bright cushions scattered about, the woven throws and rugs, the pieces of what was probably authentic Navajo pottery. It was a far cry from his scruffy L.A. condo with its litter of sports equipment. None of it fit with the Murphy she remembered.

But then, neither did the man who'd thrown that punch at her husband moments ago. While there'd been a certain amount of ebb and flow in his dislike of Remington over the course of their acquaintance, never in her experience had Murphy acted on it so explicitly. In that respect she was still getting over her surprise. It also gave her pause. What other changes had the past four-and-a-half years—years with no contact between them apart from an annual exchange of Christmas cards—made in him?

He didn't look much different, beyond a few extra pounds and nicer clothes. While hugging her on the porch he'd seemed who he'd always been: good old Murphy. But it was possible her relief that they were finally here, one step closer to proving Remington's innocence, had colored her perceptions.

Suddenly she was uncertain and even a little shy. Maybe Remington was right, and the whole trip was a mistake. Maybe they shouldn't have come.

The recollection of the danger Remington was in revived her determination. Mistake or not, she'd make it work. She had to. Murphy was their best hope for clearing Remington of murder. She wasn't about to give up, not so early in the game, without having made her pitch, for Remington's sake…and her own.

Breaking a silence that had lasted a hair too long, she asked Murphy, "How's Sherry?"

"Good. She's good. She made associate professor at UC Denver last fall."

"Wow. Congratulations. You must be so proud."

"She's thinking this is the year she'll get tenure. We'll know when the committee meets in the spring."

"And your boys?" said Remington. He was picking up Laura's lead, thank goodness, glossing over the almost-fight in the service of a greater goal. "What did you call them again?"

The smile Murphy had worn while relating his wife's accomplishments widened until he was frankly beaming. "Alexander and Zachary."

"I'll wager they're quite the handful by now, walking, talking…"

"Talking? Nah. They're only fifteen months old. The most they can manage is 'mama' and 'dada'. But they're active little guys. You should see 'em get around."

"They're fraternal twins, not identical, right?" said Laura.

"Right. Different as night and day. Zack's the one you want to watch out for. He's gonna be a holy terror."

"Or a chip off the old block?" suggested Remington.

"We were hoping we'd have a chance to meet them," said Laura.

"Sure. Sherry'll be picking them up from day care around five. In the meantime"—folding his arms, Murphy segued into sternness—"why don't you tell me what the hell is going on."

"I thought you got the whole story from Sandy Maxwell."

"I'd rather hear it from you."

Laura glanced at her husband, who responded with a gesture that signaled her to forge ahead. They'd already decided that she should be spokeswoman, anyway, and how much of the background of their relationship with Roselli they should reveal. Mexico, including the incident with the _malvados_ and the subsequent events in Las Hadas, was definitely off limits. So were the adolescent games they'd resorted to in Los Angeles when Roselli and Shannon Wayne had shown up uninvited to assume the role of honeymoon spoilers. Those early, troubled days of Laura's and Remington's marriage weren't for outside consumption.

Remington had also asked her to downplay the incidents in which Roselli had attacked her in her office. It was a request she didn't mind fulfilling. She knew better than anyone how much the memory continued to haunt him, and could understand why he'd prefer to avoid reliving it in front of Murphy.

She nodded back at her husband. "Okay," she began. "But let's get something straight at the outset. None of this is Remington's fault."

Murphy's expression communicated pure incredulity. " 'Remington'? You call him _Remington_? For real?"

"She does, actually. It happens to be my name."

" 'My name'," Murphy mimicked him. "I thought your name was Michael O'Leary. Or—wait a second. Maybe that was Richard Blaine. Or, no, I know: Douglas Quintaine."

Remington fixed Murphy with his trademark bland stare. "Enjoying yourself? Having your jollies at my expense?"

"Now that you ask, I think I am."

"Excellent. For a moment there I was worried sympathy for our predicament might rob you of your good time."

"Would you put a sock it in?" Laura demanded of them both. "Murphy, do you want to hear this or not?"

"He started it, Laura."

"Yes, and I'm likely to finish it, as well, if you don't take care."

Thoroughly exasperated, Laura put a hand to her brow. "What are you guys? Ten?"

Two masculine faces gazed back at her ruefully; two masculine voices apologized in unison. "Sorry."

"That's better." Suspecting their tractability was temporary—they were men, after all-Laura launched without preamble into her narrative. "It started last year in London, while we were on our honeymoon. You remember Daniel Chalmers? He'd gotten himself tangled up in what turned out to be a spy caper. The Soviets were involved…and so was the MI5…"

Even the Cliff Notes version of the Roselli saga took a long time. The burden of the tale rested on Laura, with Remington, faithful to their agreement, confining himself to filling in details she'd missed, or prompting her when she ran out of steam. Murphy poured drinks for them all, poked the fire occasionally and listened. By the end of it he was shaking his head.

Bad sign, Laura thought. "What's the matter?"

"You really don't see it, do you?"

"See what?"

"It's the same old story. He trashes your life just by being who he is, you risk it all to defend him." It was obvious Murphy wasn't referring to Roselli. Beside her Remington abandoned his lounging posture and sat up ramrod straight.

Laura's heart sank. The years away had blunted her memory of Murphy's character a little, but now it came rushing back. He'd always been a man whose perspective on the world was black and white, straight and narrow, color-between-the-lines. Of the three witnesses to the genesis of the living, breathing Remington Steele—him, herself and Bernice Foxe—he was the one who'd never afforded their newest partner an inch of latitude or the benefit of the doubt. "Once a thief, always a thief", or conman, or crook, was practically his daily mantra.

Earlier she'd wondered to what degree he'd changed she last saw him. The answer? Not at all, when it came to his attitude towards Remington. Or if he had, it was to become harder, more inflexible, even less inclined to cut his former rival any slack. It didn't bode well for the success of her appeal for his support in her crusade to preserve her husband's freedom. How could she convince him how much she needed Remington if he'd already made up his mind to the contrary?

The scene that unfolded was uglier than her ugliest misgivings.

For Murphy, it turned out, was just warming up. "Where's it gonna end, Laura? Huh? What's it gonna take to get through to you that he's a one-man wrecking crew? It's like that time with _The Five Nudes of Cairo_-"

Remington's air as her turned to her was smug bordering on triumphant. "What did I tell you?" Then, without waiting for her reply: "Back to that, are we?" he flung at Murphy.

"You bet we are." Murphy's tone was even, but his words slashed like a whip. "Y'know, as soon as you slithered through the agency door that first time, I had you pegged. Toxic. Guaranteed. But Laura? Somewhere she picked up the screwy idea there's something worthwhile in you. And no matter how hard Bernice and I tried to talk her out of it—no matter what _you_ said or did to prove what a jerk you were—we couldn't shake her."

"And God forbid you should ever let go of your prejudices, eh? And admit I'm not the man I was when you met me?"

"No, see, that's where you're wrong. For a minute there you did have me fooled, thinking she was safe with you…thinking you could be trusted. But guys like you, you can't be rehabilitated, not really. I hate like hell that Laura had to learn the hard way that you're her worst nightmare, but hey, you can't say I didn't warn her."

If Murphy had the remotest idea that this salvo would devastate his opponent, he was disabused of it in two seconds flat by Remington's grin. "Bravo, Murphy, bravo," he drawled. "Spoken like a true, noble, disinterested gentleman. Prompted by—dare I say it?— brotherly affection for my wife. Except we both know what's behind it. Shall we put it out where we can see it? Cards on the table, as it were?"

The situation had already degenerated past the boundaries of common politeness; Laura had to put her foot down, and fast. "Guys, I really don't think this is the time or place to-"

Locked in their mutual animosity, neither man paid her the slightest attention. "Sure," said Murphy slowly. "Cards on the table. As it were."

"I _was_ toxic the day I slithered, as you call it, into the agency," Remington went on. "I'll grant you that. Toxic to your dreams of a fuller relationship with Laura. And you've never forgiven me for it. Loyal, hard-working Murphy, caring, supportive…Any day now, Laura would sit up and take notice, and years of patient waiting would be suitably rewarded. Only I appeared on the scene. I was neither hard-working, nor loyal, or caring or supportive, but she fell in love with me anyway. Is that a fair assessment? Or have I missed the mark?"

Murphy had gone beet red; to spare him further embarrassment, Laura averted her eyes. "It's a fair assessment," she heard him say.

"Good, isn't it, to finally settle the question between us?"

"Not so fast, Steele. I haven't shown my hand."

Remington lifted an ironic eyebrow. "Of course. Have at it. It's only sporting."

They might really have been playing the final round of a game of high-stakes poker, so intently were they focused on each other. Their jaws were equally tight, their fists clenched, their stances almost identical, leaning slightly forward from the waist. The suggestion of a mocking smile still hovered at the corners of Remington's mouth. Laura's heart began to pound painfully in her chest.

And then Murphy did it: ripped away the shred of hope she'd been clinging to since Remington's announcement that Windsor Thomas was dead, and he was implicated in her murder.

"I'm willing to take Laura's word for it that you didn't kill that reporter," he said. "But that's as far as it goes. If you ask me, this murder rap is poetic justice for every twisted scheme you've gotten away with over the years. And if throwing you in jail is what it takes to keep you from messing up her life more than you already have…I'm all for it.

It was a piece of breath-taking cruelty and unheard of for Murphy; Laura couldn't help but gasp. Remington, she saw, had gone white to the lips. Before she could leap to his defense, he was setting his glass down on the coffee table and climbing to his feet.

"Yes, well. At least we know where everybody stands," he said. His voice shook with rage, but otherwise he exercised an admirable self-control. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'll leave the two of you to your reunion. No doubt you've a lot of reminiscing to do." And he stalked from the room without meeting her eyes.

Immediately she jumped up and gave chase. Not quickly enough; the house was already reverberating with the crash of the front door he'd slammed behind him. By the time she made it outside, he was already at the bottom of the driveway. "Remington! Wait!"

For a beat it seemed as if he intended to ignore her altogether, but then he allowed her to catch up. "So much for our modern-day Will Kane riding to the rescue," he said.

"Did you have to bait him? Couldn't you have been—I don't know—nicer, more diplomatic-?"

"Smile and nod and agree while he raked me over the coals in front of my wife, you mean? Not to mention mentally locking me up in prison and throwing away the key?"

"No, but why rub his face in the past? You knew how he'd react!"

He opened his mouth to retort, but apparently thought better of it. One hand raked furiously through his hair. "Go back to the house, Laura," he growled.

"What about you?"

"You heard the man. I can't be trusted. You're not safe with me."

"He didn't mean it. He was upset, blowing off steam, you remember how he gets-"

"If you believe that, you don't know your friend very well."

Totally at a loss for what to say or do to make it better, she stood gazing at him. She always hated to see him get hurt; she wanted nothing more than to put her arms around him, hold him and comfort him. With chagrin she acknowledged that it was the first time in a week she would've played the role of the consoler rather than the consoled.

That was because he'd been so stalwart, so steady, absorbing blow after blow without losing his footing. After a few days she'd stopped worrying about the impact on him. In fact she'd taken it for granted that he was okay, and sheltered gratefully in his strength.

But that look in his eyes told a different story. A casual observer would've diagnosed it as anger, but she read the underlying pain. Murphy's barbs had struck Remington where he was most vulnerable: his struggle to believe himself worthy, worthy of her trust, worthy of her in general. Coming from the man whose acceptance Remington had always sought in spite of himself, but never fully received, they were bound to cut twice as deep.

Aching along with him, she laid a hand on his arm. "Please don't go off by yourself. Please. I'll talk to him—I'll show him how unfair he's being-"

"Laura." In the quiet voice was a steely note she recognized.

"Yes?"

"Go back inside."

There was no choice but to do what he asked. He couldn't prevent her from lingering on the Michaels' porch to watch him stride away, though. Her eyes followed the tall, upright figure with the bowed head and hands jammed into jeans pockets until a curve in the road hid it from view.

Funny, but the outrage she'd worked up against Murphy seemed to disappear with her husband. Hopelessness renewed its grip on her. Instead of storming back into the house to give Murphy what for, she resumed her seat on the couch, rested her elbows on her knees and hid her face in her upraised hands.

She felt rather than saw it when Murphy moved across and sat down next to her. "Hey," he said. "You okay?"

She turned her head to look up at him. "He didn't want to come. I practically had to twist his arm. Murphy's the only one who can help us prove you're innocent, I said."

"Me help _him_? Are you serious?"

"I thought maybe you'd do it if I asked you to." In her mind's eye she could see him, Remington, solitary, walking the unfamiliar streets of a strange neighborhood in a strange city in a futile effort to outstrip the accumulated echoes of thirty-three years, the ones reminding him he was worthless, he was flawed, he wasn't good enough and never would be…

"Laura?" Murphy said, bringing her back to herself.

"I'm asking you as my friend. Will you help us? Please? Help us prove he didn't do it."

By now they were sitting shoulder to shoulder. It was the perfect vantage point for observing the play of his features as he wrestled with his predisposition towards doing what she asked simply because she asked it, versus holding the line against Steele. It was clear the outcome could go either way.

A little judiciously applied pressure couldn't hurt, she thought. "He's not the man he was when we met him," she said. "He's right about that. Whatever he's done in the past, he doesn't deserve to go to jail for a murder he didn't commit."

When her voice broke shamefully on the last words, she wasn't playacting. Murphy slid his arm around her shoulders. "I was out of line," he said. "Again. For what it's worth, I wish I could take it back."

"You were trying to protect me, the way you used to."

"Yeah, I was. I forgot it's not my job anymore. It hasn't been for a long time. Not since"—he hesitated—"not since _he_ came along."

The evidence that he was beginning to unbend made her smile. "He's gotten pretty good at it, you know? Only don't tell him I said so. The one thing that hasn't changed is his ego."

"I got that part."

"He's a good man, Murph. He wasn't always, but he is now. And he's good for me. If you only knew what we've been through together…"

While she spoke she was remembering the ebony gleam of a brand new grand piano in an empty, otherwise unadorned warehouse loft. The defiance in Remington's voice as he cursed Alessandro Castagnoli and carried her through a crowd of partygoers to the exit from the murderer's grand _casa_. A swollen ankle and dehydration borne of heat exhaustion and a long, angry gash in his leg, incurred when he launched his plan to stop Anna's blackmail a few hours too early because 'it meant I could come home to you sooner, Laura'.

"…Maybe someday I can make you understand," she finished.

Murphy checked his wristwatch. "Sherry won't be home for another half hour. And if Steele's anything like I remember, it'll take him a while to cool off. How about you tell me now?"

So that was what she did.

TO BE CONTINUED


	5. PART I: Chapter 5

**A/N: I just wanted to let everyone know how much I appreciate the feedback you've given so far on this story, and on chapter 4 in particular. It's gratifying to know the path I've taken with the Steele/Murphy dynamic has struck a positive chord! I've always had a soft spot for Murphy's character and have been waiting since the beginning of the SI series for a chance to draw him into the mix in a way that would do him justice. Lacking the skill to write the kind of banter he and Steele traded in the original series (though in person my default outlook on life is liberally laced with dry wit, comedy's obviously not my strong suit) I turned to the next best thing: the unresolved tension between them. Glad you liked it. Look for more to come.**

**Some of you either didn't sign in to fficnet before uploading your reviews or have disabled the PM feature. summerside (if you're still reading), K, monstercurl, maria and Mary K: I'd like to thank you personally for taking the time to tell me what you thought. It means a lot.**

**rx9872: Your multiple reviews as you read your way through the SI series truly left me speechless. All I can say is, thank you, sincerely, for the compliments. I'm so pleased you've enjoyed the stories, and to have you join us for the rest of the ride.**

**A/N2: Since the French restaurant where Steele passed out personalized brass nameplates in "Tempered Steele" is never named, I've christened it with the address of Maxim's in Paris.  
~MG**

Chapter 5

Remington and Laura had first met Sherry Michaels, née Webster, no relation to Dwayne, over the course of a surreal weekend.

That was May 1983. Early one Saturday morning, Steele had exercised his talent for stumbling across down-and-outers desperate for help by talking a suicidal Federal Reserve Bank employee named Alfred Hollis down from a freeway overpass. Consequently the agency's prime objective had become preventing Hollis from achieving his death wish while simultaneously proving he hadn't embezzled millions in condemned currency from the bank. First Laura had been tapped for assistance, then Murphy, and, along with him, Sherry. A novice at the private eye game, Sherry had nevertheless thrown herself into the task with relish. There was no denying that her unique arsenal of skills—psychologist, film maven and crane operator-had come in handy at several critical moments.

And_ voilà_! For approximately forty-eight hours, which was the time it took to clear Hollis, a foursome was born.

They'd made a good team. So had Murphy and Sherry, who, it turned out, Murphy had only met on Friday night. By the time Monday morning rolled around, the serene little blonde had him wrapped around her finger. Laura was intrigued and resolved to get to know Sherry better.

She meant to. Really she did. But somehow it ended up at the bottom of her list of priorities. The Hollis case wasn't a spur to romance only for Murphy and Sherry; Laura and Steele had done their share of bonding when she slipped and nearly fell from a construction I-beam Sherry was using to transport them via crane to the roof of the Federal Reserve Bank. In fact, their relationship had immediately heated up at a speed that was breathtaking, considering their previous emotional snail's pace. Within a week or two of the close of the case, the final contestant in Steele's parade of buxom bimbos had been shown the door, no further purchases of brass nameplates appeared on his running tab at 3 Rue de Royale, and he was spending practically every evening with Laura.

Classic Steele: he didn't have the words to explain the lightning turnaround in his behavior, or to satisfy her need for an overt declaration of some kind. It wasn't until they were married that he was able to confess that the struggle to pull her to safety had opened his eyes to how much he loved her. Still, if she were honest with herself, she would've admitted his actions were consistent with those of man who cared very deeply and very passionately for her. He'd even hinted at it in those exact words! No wonder she was so absorbed in her own blossoming romance, she gave scarcely a thought to Murphy's.

She never saw his resignation coming.

To say the day she accepted it was one of the saddest in her life wasn't an exaggeration. Murphy, her Havenhurst buddy, her dedicated partner in the agency, the brother she'd never had, leaving forever! She'd consoled herself that she would've felt far worse if he were fleeing Los Angeles with his head hanging in defeat, the odd man out of a lover's triangle. Instead he was embracing a new life in Denver with a woman who adored him and supported him in his dream of opening his own detective agency. Sherry had even found a teaching position in the psychology department at the University of Colorado-Denver. Sorry as Laura was to see him go, she was satisfied that he—and his heart—were in the best of hands.

Now here they all were five years later, reunited, sipping an after-dinner glass of wine in front of the fire in the Michaels' Denver living room. It felt good, Laura thought, but a little weird. It was even weirder that Murphy had suggested the nightcap; weirder still, that he was architect of the entire evening.

Unbelievable but true. Murphy Michaels—the straight-ahead guy with no curves or wiggles in his personality, who saw the world in black and white and colored between the lines and was convinced Remington was Laura's worst nightmare—had taken the initial baby steps towards mending the quarrel. He was the reason the two men had reached a rapprochement of sorts—a more accurate word than "reconciliation" to describe the uneasy peace forged between them.

It was fortunate that Murphy had stepped up to the plate, because if it were left to Remington, the Steeles would've been halfway to someplace else by now. He'd returned from a walk of thirty minutes' duration with his face composed into an affable mask that didn't quite hide the anger it was supposed to cover. "I'm here to collect my wife," he'd told Murphy, and extended a hand to Laura. "Shall we, Mrs. Steele?"

Laura was about to launch a protest, or at least a cogent argument. But Murphy rendered it unnecessary by rising from his seat on the couch. "Steele," he'd said with a sideways jerk of the head, and moved a few paces towards the living room doorway. There was no chance Remington could mistake the tacit invitation to join him.

Remington didn't. For a moment he'd remained where he was, shifting his weight from foot to foot. Then, with a single, eloquent glance over his shoulder at Laura, hands firmly in pockets, he'd sauntered off in Murphy's wake.

Watching them out of sight, Laura couldn't hold back: she jumped up to pace.

It was the most effective outlet for her surging excitement. Call her idealistic, but the fact that the men had exhibited a modicum of restraint towards one another just now had spoken volumes. If they really listened to each other…if they could agree…it was possible they might consign the romantic tension they'd resuscitated to the past, where it belonged. Maybe the clash would blow over without inflicting any permanent damage. And maybe, just maybe, Murphy would relent completely, and tell Remington he was taking their case…

He hadn't made Laura any promises on that score. In fact, he hadn't responded to her request for help either way. But he had listened without interruption to her account of the obstacles she and Remington had faced and overcome together since his departure for Denver and at the end of it had said on a note of rising wonder: "Son of a gun. I didn't realize he had it in him."

She would never know then or later how the conversation between the two fell out; Remington expertly deflected every question she ever put to him on the subject. Besides, Sherry had arrived in the interim with her babies in tow. The flurry of liberating the twins from their double stroller and snowsuits, making introductions and renewing an old acquaintanceship, had effectively diverted Laura's attention. By the time the men joined them in the enormous kitchen-cum-family room, a friendlier atmosphere had begun to take tentative hold.

The twins had by rights immediately co-opted center stage. Frolicsome as a couple of puppies, Alex and Zack toddled straight for their father, babbling ecstatically. Murphy swooped them up in the air one by one, which made them scream with delight. From across the room Laura took note of the look in Remington's eyes as he watched the threesome: enthralled, yearning, wistful.

At last Murphy set Zack on his feet and knelt with an arm around each son. "This is Mr. Steele. Can you guys say hello? C'mon. Say 'hi'. 'Hi, Mr. Steele'."

Alex, tow-headed, brown-eyed, taller and more slender, was also the shyer of the two; he shrank back and clutched his father's sweater. Zack in the meantime was stumping forward on stocky little legs. He had a blazing thatch of wavy red-gold hair and cornflower blue eyes that gazed fearlessly up at Remington.

Remington crouched to meet him, reaching for his hand. To Murphy and Sherry he said: "A bold one, isn't he?"

"That's one way of looking at it," Murphy said dryly.

"And who have we here?" Remington said to Zack. He shook the chubby hand. "Look at you. Hello, little Zachary. Hi. Hi."

Zack answered with a string of incomprehensible yet emphatic syllables and crowed with laughter. "I think he likes me," Remington grinned up at the other adults.

"Sure he does," Sherry beamed. "He senses you're a friend. Tell you what, why don't we move it out to the living room. Honey"—this was directed at Murphy—"can you take Alex? Mr. Steele can carry Zack."

She'd issued the reflexive command as if Remington truly were an old friend. Laura shot Murphy a quick glance to gauge how he was reacting to it. Only an hour ago he was insisting Remington couldn't be trusted with her; how would that attitude translate to his little boy?

Apparently it didn't. Swinging Alex up into his arms, he seemed not to have heard. Anyway it was too late, for Remington, flushed with the success of his introduction to the youngest Michaels, was already pretending he was an elevator and Zack was his passenger. The scene reminded Laura of one of her favorite pre-marital memories of Remington playing with her nephew and nieces on the agency floor while she and Donald struggled to cope with an overwrought Frances.

Frances. Their mother. Mercilessly she pushed the thought of them away. Too much had been said in the disastrous phone conversations she'd had with them the morning after the news of her disgrace had broken, words that couldn't be taken back, nor forgiven and forgotten. More to the point, they were ample proof of what she'd realized years ago: her family couldn't be depended on, not for anything.

Damn it, the stupid tears were stinging behind her eyes. In an attempt to block the flow at its source she concentrated on Remington and Zack. The child's flaming red head juxtaposed against Remington's dark one created a striking contrast; it also reminded her of the compromise she and her husband had worked out in terms of having a baby of their own. Was it really only eight days ago that she'd told him yes, they would do it, as soon as she was more confident in her ability to be a good mother? It could've been decades, centuries, so distant did it seem. Another time. A different world.

But not forever out of reach. She refused to cede that hope to Roselli. There was no question that their current crisis would indefinitely prolong the postponement she and Remington had agreed on. But someday…when they were demonstrably, firmly and irrevocably the Steeles once again…she would fulfill her promise, and Remington's dream.

She sidled a little closer to him as the entire group trooped towards the living room. "You're a natural, Mr. Steele," she said softly. And she patted him on one of the most irresistible portions of his anatomy: his rear.

The surprise in his downward glance swiftly transformed itself into a twinkle. "Shame on you, Mrs. Steele," he smirked. "Whatever would your friend Murphy and his wife say if they saw you manhandling your husband in public? Emphasis on _man_ and _hand_. And in front of their offspring, too?"

"I don't know about Murphy, but I think as a clinical psychologist Sherry would deduce there's no need to analyze your performance."

To call the ensuing small talk between the two couples stilted would've been generous, though it did result in a dinner invitation from Sherry ("nothing fancy, just steaks on the grill, but we'd love to have you join us.") Murphy's expression revealed neither enthusiasm nor its opposite. As for Remington, Laura waited for his imperceptible shrug signaling he could stand a few more hours in Murphy's company before she accepted for them both.

During dinner the constraint gradually began to melt away. There Alex and Zack played a central role, literally and figuratively. The twins seemed to regard the strangers as a private audience summoned just for them; the resulting hilarity smoothed over what might've been a few awkward moments among the grownups. And, after their parents put the boys down for the night, reminiscences of the Hollis case fueled the growing camaraderie.

Not once did the trouble the Steeles were in come up in the conversation, however. Not, that was, until they were gathered in the living room again. Pouring the wine, Murphy said casually, "Y'know, you guys oughta fill Sherry in on this Roselli character. Maybe she could give you some insight on how to handle him."

Remington and Laura looked at each other and then at Murphy. "Sometimes it can go a long way towards solving a case," he explained. "Believe me, I've been there."

"I'd be happy to help, if there's anything I can do," added Sherry.

Unlike with Murphy, the Steeles took turns bringing Sherry up to speed. She put questions to them every now and again, jotting on a pad she'd picked up from a side table. For all that she was an excellent listener who maintained eye contact and nodded frequently in affirmation, sympathy or encouragement as the mood warranted.

"…and the last we heard, he was making the rounds of Mr. Steele's old acquaintances," Laura said, nearing the end of the story. "People who might be…susceptible…to bribery or threats. We don't think he's picked up our scent, not yet. Then again, he has an uncanny way of turning up when and where we least expect him...lurking in the shadows until he's ready to pounce." She glanced at Remington. "Have I left anything out?"

"On the contrary, you've done a proper job of supplying the fine detail."

"What's the verdict, honey?" Murphy was addressing Sherry.

Before she responded, Sherry ran an eye over her notes again. "In my professional opinion, you're dealing with a borderline megalomaniac," she said when she was finished.

Laura regarded her thoughtfully. "A person with a god complex."

"Mm-hm. Crossed with obvious homicidal tendencies. Of course I'd have to spend time with him one-on-one to confirm the diagnosis. But the behavior you're describing points to it."

"What you're saying is we're being hounded by a madman," put in Remington.

"Not exactly. Every personality has its pathologies. Some of us are better at integrating them than others, that's all. The good news is he's probably no more insane than I am."

"Ah. I knew there was a bright side to this."

"What do we do about it?" asked Laura. "I mean, how do we fight him? To use an appropriate analogy, we've thrown our best pitches, and he's still batting a thousand.

"And going to the police for help isn't an option."

To Laura the statement hinted strongly that Sherry knew the truth about Remington Steele. And that could only mean one thing. She directed a reproachful glance at Murphy, who protested, "I didn't tell her, I swear."

Sherry's green eyes were alight with curiosity. "Tell me what?"

"Well…" Laura floundered for a plausible explanation. "There are some…irregularities…in the way we do—did—business as an agency. Mr. Steele was—is-the boss, but I'm—I was-in charge-"

"Rather like our married life," quipped Remington. "What Laura's trying to say is, Remington Steele Investigations isn't quite what it seems. Neither am I, for that matter. We've done nothing illegal, but we fear the general public won't appreciate the rationale behind our pulling the wool over their eyes."

Slapping a hand to his forehead, Murphy groaned. "Now you've done it. Nice work, Steele. If you don't tell her now, I'll never hear the end of it."

"He's right," Sherry said. "Mysteries drive me crazy."

"Indeed." Remington nudged Laura. "Up to you."

Carte blanche to divulge as much of his history as she saw fit: that was what he was giving her. To be honest, Laura had already begun to question her knee-jerk inclination towards concealing Remington Steele's origins. Sherry had long ago proven herself trustworthy; there was a good chance the truth would lead her to another conclusion the Steeles hadn't thought of; she might be willing to sway Murphy to their side if he was still on the fence over playing an active role in their cause. All in all the upside of adding one more member to the inner circle was bigger than the downside, Laura thought.

"What the hell," she said. "In for a penny, in for a pound. Care to do the honors, Mr. Steele?"

"Pleasure. But where to begin…?" Remington took on the air he always did when preparing to weave a cut-and-tried collection of facts into a fascinating yarn, the usual charming-roguish grin playing around his mouth. "How's this for a deep, dark secret?" he asked Sherry. "The great detective Remington Steele? He doesn't exist. My wife invented him. Confused? Allow me to enlighten you…"

It was almost word-for-word the story as Laura had recounted it to him a few days after he stepped into Steele's shoes, when he'd interrupted a session in which they were hammering out the terms of his employment to demand just what in blazes he was getting himself into. Was it surprising that he recalled it so accurately? Not anymore. She'd become too familiar with the powers of his prodigious memory to be bowled over by them now.

What _was _surprising was Sherry's reaction. Far from shocked or disapproving, she was deeply absorbed, even riveted. And when he got to the last line—"She didn't even know my real name"—Sherry burst out, "But that's absolutely amazing!"

"It is?" Just like the old days, Laura, Remington and Murphy responded in unison without intending to.

Sherry's eyes were brighter than ever. "And inspiring. Laura, do you realize what you've done? You've struck a blow for every smart, strong, talented woman out there who's had her life's dream denied because of her sex. You're a trailblazer!"

Laura blinked. "I am?" Out of the corner of her eye she spied the inevitable lift of Remington's left brow.

"You could've backed off and settled for less," Sherry continued. "Or scaled down your ambitions to fit the traditional mold. But you didn't. You turned their chauvinistic restrictions around and used them to make yourself into what _you _wanted to be."

"I never thought of it that way."

"A truly liberated woman. I wish you didn't think you have to hide it. Your story would resonate with modern women everywhere. They'd be a hundred per cent on your side, I'm sure."

It was a bit too much for Laura; with a quick gesture she waved off the praise. "If only our former clients could see if from your point of view. They've been talking to the newspapers… some of them have been pretty harsh." She sighed. "By now our reputation's so far in the dumper, I'm afraid not even our publicist can restore it."

Aside from trading an amused masculine glance with Remington, Murphy had held aloof from the dialogue. Now he said abruptly: "Laura, I think you and Steele are overlooking something."

It was a much blunter approach than he would've used five years ago. The difference between being an employee and an employer, Laura thought, and didn't hold it against him. But it was plain from Remington's tone as he fielded the question that he did resent it. Immensely.

Male vanity: was there any cure for it? She swallowed a smile.

"Oh? What's that?" Remington was demanding of Murphy.

"I get why Laura doesn't want to confess she invented Remington Steele. But there's another way to prove this Roselli clown isn't him. I'm kind of surprised you"-Murphy had transferred his gaze to Laura—"haven't already thought of it."

The Steeles were silent, waiting for the punch line.

"Find out who he is. Back it up with irrefutable proof. How hard can it be?"

"We did try," Laura said. "Last June, right after we got married."

"And?"

"Dead end." Quickly she filled Murphy in on the results of the investigation, the photo of a soldier who couldn't be anyone but a young PFC Anthony Roselli, the facts of his death in West Germany and his burial in a cemetery in Brooklyn.

"That's it?" Murphy replied. "I mean, come on, the guy's obviously alive. And it's been what? Six months since you last saw him?" He shook his head. "I'm really disappointed. I thought you two were better than that."

Beside her Remington was suddenly bristling with aggression, a feeling as electric as brushing one's hand the wrong way over the fur of a cat. Thinly disguising it with a lazy grin, he said, "No doubt, no doubt. Of course, our plate has been slightly on the full side. It's called paying cases. Perhaps you're familiar with the concept…?"

They went on scrapping, but Laura resisted her perpetual urge to separate them before mayhem could result. At the edge of her consciousness was that delicious little prickle, the one that signaled the unfolding of a new insight. She'd been missing it since Roselli's television appearance last Friday. With an inward throb compounded of recognition, relief and gratitude, she welcomed its return.

Giving it her full concentration meant tuning out the rest of the room. Oblivious to her companions, she rose and slowly walked to the tall windows with the view of the Rockies, though it was too dark to see anything. The dots were there, in her mind; it was up to her to connect them…

At last the outlines of a plan began to emerge.

Quinnipiac, Connecticut.

Elaine Casselas.

Boston.

Of course! she thought.

"Murph, has a box of papers from Mildred Krebs been delivered to our attention at your office?" she asked as she re-crossed to the couch.

"Oh, yeah, good thing you reminded me. Why do you ask?"

"The Boston Marathon."

"What about it?" This from Murphy and Remington; it was followed by a double take at one another and a mutual scowl.

"Remington entered me in it for a Christmas present. Remember, Mr. Steele? It's how we'll lure Roselli into the open. We'll find a way to let him know I'm running and wait for him to rise to the bait."

Aglow with the excitement of her breakthrough, she gazed around at the three faces that surrounded her: Sherry's admiring, Murphy's congratulatory and Remington's—well, she wasn't ready to evaluate Remington's expression and put a label on it. Not yet.

Once again a smile formed itself on her lips. Only this time she didn't swallow it

"And then," she said, "we'll nail him to the wall."

TO BE CONTINUED


	6. PART I: Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"Aren't you going to say anything?" Laura asked Remington, breaking a short but ominous silence.

She was at the wheel of the Fleetwood; they were en route to an RV park to discover whether or not it was too late to snag a spot for the night. It was a sudden whim of Remington's, not a real need, for Murphy had invited them to camp on his property as long as they were in Denver. All faked hearty gratitude and surface good humor, Remington had responded with a self-deprecating comment about taking care not to overstay their welcome. Only Laura had registered the spark smoldering under the smile in his blue eyes.

He was furious. And quite possibly primed for explosion. And he didn't want the Michaels within earshot if or when that happened.

So far during the ride across town, she'd done all the talking, and who could blame her? In the end their visit with the Michaels had fulfilled her greatest hopes. Murphy wanted the Steeles to accompany him to the office the next morning, where he would bring his entire team in on the Windsor Thomas case. As a result she was keyed up and exultant and ready—no, eager!—to discuss the merits of her Boston Marathon plan with her clearly skeptical husband.

His replies up to that point had amounted to little more than grunts, but now he managed a real sentence. "I believe you've already said enough for both of us."

"I meant, don't you have anything to say about my idea."

"Oh. That. Why bother? I'd only be wasting my breath."

"I'd really like to hear your thoughts."

"You know my thoughts. They haven't changed since the last time you proposed to put yourself at the mercy of a nasty predator out for blood. Or have you forgotten Joan Grey?"

His reference was to a mystery in which they'd accidentally become embroiled approximately a year before, when a runaway wife had switched Laura's entrant credentials for the Westside Triathlon with her own. There was a strong enough resemblance between the two to fool the detectives Joan Grey's husband had hired to find Joan into mistaking Laura for her. Later, as a disconcerting new twist emerged—Joan was also the target of a group who wanted to coerce her chemist husband into giving up the formula for a blood-doping compound he'd discovered—Laura had adopted the masquerade on purpose. Dressed like Joan, she'd taken to the mean streets around Union Station to draw Gullickson, Ivory and Aguirre away from their quarry.

As it happened, her little rescue mission had gone exactly as she intended, except for a single hitch. Though Remington had faithfully kept pace with her for hours, they'd become separated near the train yard. Too bad she couldn't shake one of the thugs, a former track star named Ivory, as easily. He'd caught up with her just as an express pulled into the station and, under cover of the train's arrival, jumped her. Thank God some instinct had directed Remington's search for her to the very spot. He'd clobbered Ivory before any lasting harm was done.

The incident was as fresh in her mind as it was in his; she had no problem admitting it to him. "It's what gave me the idea in the first place," she added. "Sending me out as her decoy worked so well, why not try it on Roselli?"

"_Worked_? Is that what you call it?"

"It flushed out Ivory and the others and diverted them away from Joan, which was our goal. In my book that's success."

"Because of a fluke! Because I happened to turn in the right direction when Ivory was chasing you along the railroad tracks! He had you down, Laura—a split second either way, and he'd have pummeled the daylights out of you, or worse-!"

The RV park was coming up on the left. She negotiated the turn into its driveway and headed towards what looked to be the manager's office, a maneuver that afforded her a moment or two to school her tone into mild reasonableness. "Well, this time we'll have an even bigger advantage. Mid-morning, huge crowds, police presence…And you'll be there to shadow me from the starting gun to the finish line."

"Why am I not comforted?" So withering was the sarcasm, she could almost feel its heat.

Their visit to the park manager's office preventing him from venting it any further; he had to content himself with glaring at her each time their eyes met. Arrived at their out-of-the-way camp site, she tried to lend a hand with the irksome but necessary daily chores that were part of life in an RV. Remington had quickly gained proficiency with the Fleetwood's holding tanks and connections to sewage, water and electrical hookups, and taught her everything he knew. Usually it was kind of fun, working in tandem to keep their home-away-from-home functioning.

But tonight he shooed her inside. "You may as well save it, because I'm on to you," he said from between clenched teeth as he clamped a hose from the black water tank to the sewage line. "A little marital teamwork, a judicious division of labor. Eh? And you'll have sufficiently softened me up so I'll forget what we're arguing about. Well, think again. You won't get round me that way."

That took her aback: since when did he see through her with such clarity? But it did nothing to change her mind. Her plan was too brilliant to surrender at the first sign of opposition from Remington.

The question was, could she maintain the nerve to go through with it? Preparing for bed in the closet-sized bathroom, she acknowledged how short the bravado she'd assumed in front of Murphy and Sherry fell of true courage. Beneath it she hadn't overcome her fear of Roselli in the slightest. Part of her would've preferred to run and keep running as fast as they could until they reached a safe harbor where he could never touch them again. Once upon a time Remington had fantasized about them unearthing an ill-gotten Pick Six ticket and "chucking" Los Angeles to live out their lives incognito on some tropical island. His dream was looking mighty tempting right about now.

Which was exactly why she couldn't give in. That terrified impulse towards flight? It wasn't like her. Remembering the ease with which she'd already succumbed to it, she was ashamed of herself, and more than a little angry. It seemed she was rapidly becoming the kind of woman she despised: timid, dependent, weak. If she didn't break the downward spiral now, with so much at stake, when would she ever?

By the time Remington came inside, she was established with a book on the sofa between the bedroom and the galley, aiming for all she was worth to look nonchalant. The ironical once-over he gave her said the pretence didn't fool him for a second. "Waiting up for me, Mrs. Steele? Or merely waiting to pounce?"

"I thought if we brainstormed the logistics, you'd feel more comfortable with the marathon set-up."

"I see." Stooping to allow for the height differential, he was washing his hands at the kitchen sink. "Time for plan B, is it?"

"Plan B?"

"Talk me to death until I submit out of sheer exhaustion."

"It's not such a wild idea, when you think about it. How many times have you said you were sick and tired of always dancing to Roselli's tune? This is our chance to take the initiative and deal with him on our terms. We haven't had that since the night we broke into his apartment."

He snorted. "As if Antony could be so easily manipulated."

"We can do it if we play it right." She laid the book aside; it was nothing but a prop, anyway. "Come on. It's got everything you love, and you know it. Bold, daring, unexpected-"

"—and misguided and ill-conceived and full of holes big enough to accommodate a lorry."

"Such as?"

"The marathon's less than three weeks away, and you haven't raced in months."

"I'll work out eight hours a day if I have to. Besides, it's not like I'll really be competing."

"How do you propose we get there, if flying's out of the question?"

"Same way we have been-driving. It shouldn't take more than a week if we pull it in shifts."

"And the messenger who'll tip him off?"

"Two words. Elaine Casselas."

This—the name of the girl Roselli was sleeping with, if Casselas' recent letter to the agency was to be believed—was the glue that held Laura's plan together; she was justifiably proud that she'd thought of it. But instead of admiring it for the stroke of genius it was, Remington banged shut the cupboard in which he'd been rummaging for who knew what. "You've an answer for everything, haven't you?"

"You say that like it's a bad thing." He didn't speak so she added: "I thought this was what you wanted, us working together to stop him."

This patently didn't rate a response, judging by his expression.

"I'm trying to channel my fear, in case you hadn't noticed."

Neither did this.

"Murphy thinks it's a good idea." A sly dig, she was well aware, but also the truth, and Remington knew it.

It hit the nerve it was supposed to. "Oh, yes, it's easy for Murphy," he snapped. "With his nice tidy house, his wife and children safe, his very own agency where he can shuffle autopsy reports to his heart's content-"

Sensing success was within reach, she couldn't resist the urge to goad him a tiny bit more.

She said: "At least he gives me credit for being able to take care of myself."

"Of course he does, Laura, but he wasn't there the last time Roselli got his hands on you, was he, and he's no idea what it's like-"

To her consternation she saw that he'd begun to shake. His voice was hoarsening with emotion, too. "Remington—what on earth-?" she said.

But he wasn't hearing her, had, in fact, raised his voice to drown hers out. "-_What it's like_ to find his wife in the state I found you-"

"Okay, okay, take it easy-"

"—To be the man who relives it over and over, trying to understand how he might've stopped it-"

Frightened by the look on his face, she crossed to him and tried to put her arms around him-no small feat, since he remained stiff and unyielding in her embrace. "Shhhhh…Okay, sweetheart. Shhhhh…"

"—Wishing he could put back the clock to that moment in the alley, and shoot to kill the way he meant to-"

Words were useless. Finally she understood it and stopped fumbling for the right ones. Instead she tightened her arms and simply held him, overwhelmed by what she'd unwittingly set in motion.

"—Knowing he failed you when you needed him the most-!"

There the storm ended abruptly as it had blown up. That was because he'd turned away, out of the circle of her arms, and with palms flat on the countertop stood bracing himself against it. Even with his back to her she could see he'd bowed his head; his shoulders rose and fell with the deep breaths he was gulping in.

She hovered behind him, wrung by his distress, but tongue-tied. A long time ago she'd realized that the memory of what Roselli had done to her haunted Remington more than he let on. It wasn't in his nature to take it lightly. But never—not until now-had she suspected how consuming and pervasive and poisoned by self-recrimination it actually was. The way he'd spoken of it just now, obliquely, in the third person, keeping it at a remove, was the proof. The wound was deep, she thought, beyond the power of any comforting platitudes she might offer him. Maybe it was beyond cure.

So she did the only thing she could. Regardless that she was risking another rebuff, she slid her arms around his waist and pressed herself against his back. "I didn't know," she whispered. "I didn't know."

His breath caught in his throat. "So now you do. For all the good it'll do us." And he fulfilled her expectations by breaking free of her again and heading for the bedroom.

She was right on his heels.

From the doorway she watched as he stomped around, pulling his pajamas out of a drawer of one of the built-in cabinets and shedding his clothes. He didn't spare a glance for her, but that was probably due more to shame over his show of weakness than anything else. When he was finished he flicked off the wall-mounted lamps over the bed and flung himself full length onto the mattress.

It wasn't so dark that she couldn't see he was lying on his back with hands clasped behind his head. She flicked the light above her pillow back on again. Then she sat tailor-fashion close to his side. Obviously it was up to her to break the silence, but where to begin?

Tentatively she fingered the buttons of his pajama jacket. "Remington…sweetheart…it isn't your fault. None of it is your fault."

His eyes dropped to her hand, moved to her face and returned to the ceiling.

"It was him, all him. You didn't fail me."

Silence again. Patiently she waited it out.

At length he sighed. "It's late; it's been a long day. Let it go, Laura."

As if that would put her off. Even he recognized the lameness of his attempt, she could tell. The acknowledgement was in his dry glance as she took his hand.

She pressed her lips to a spot just above his knuckles and laced her fingers through his. "Do you remember the first case we worked on out of the country?"

"Acapulco. Hector Figueroa."

"I asked you to steal away with me, but you turned me down. You'd stolen a famous piece of jewelry six, seven years before-"

"-The necklace from the Marchesa Collection-"

"—and the Acapulco police were still after you. But Hector called the office that night and warned you I was in danger. So you jumped on the very next flight out."

"A proceeding that earned me a fair amount of feminine scorn, as I recall."

"Well, I couldn't let you operate under the mistaken impression that I need a baby-sitter or bodyguard, could I? And then you cooked up that hare-brained scheme based on _Notorious_. There I was, spying on a ring of international thieves, only they were already onto me, and slipped me a mickey. And locked me up in Pepés while they decided what to do with me."

"My first and last rescue by parasail." He chuckled. "And Mildred towing me along in the power boat, head spinning from the pace of events, wide-eyed with hero worship, eager to please…Ah, the good old days. It's been so long I'd almost forgotten."

He sounded more himself, relaxed and amused; she laughed out of pure relief. "I'm glad one of us was having fun."

"Fun isn't quite the way I'd describe it, but it'll do in a pinch."

Turning her hand, she stroked his with the ball of her thumb. "If I tell you something, will you promise not to get upset?"

"I'll do my best to rein it in."

"I was…a little nervous about that whole caper."

"Understandable, given the circumstances."

"That's not what I mean. I was nervous about you."

"Afraid you wouldn't be able to resist me?" The remark contained overtones of the leer that briefly quirked his lips and eyebrows.

She shook her head. "I wasn't sure I could count on you. And when things started to look dicey, all I could think of was that time with _The Five Nudes of Cairo_. Would you come through for me? Or would you run? I didn't know the answer to that."

Another silence, in which the soft in-and-out of his breathing was audible. Though he hadn't moved a muscle, his very stillness suddenly conveyed tension. Either he was hanging on her every word, or she was probing too near the wound and he was bracing against the pain, she wasn't sure which.

Determinedly, but with great care, she forged onward.

"But you did come through," she said. "I think that was what sealed our partnership for good. I knew I could trust you to back me up, just like Murphy used to. And you _have_ backed me up, over and over again, ever since."

He'd averted his gaze, was focusing on a point somewhere above him and to his right. "Not always." The huskiness was back in his voice. It was implicit at this point who they were speaking of, though neither of them so much as mentioned Roselli's name.

"Yes, you have," she insisted. "You were looking for me that morning…you were on your way to the office. You would've stopped him if you could. That's what matters. Why can't you see it?"

"…You'll never understand."

"I want to. I'm trying to."

But you're not making it easy, she almost added. At the last second she refrained. Meanwhile his expression was shuttered, offering no clue to his thoughts.

She heaved a sigh of gentle exasperation. It was entirely feasible, given their history and their personalities, that they could go around and around like this for hours, even days, and never reach a resolution. On the other hand, one of them could make a conclusive move towards breaking the impasse. She doubted that Remington in his current state of mind was even thinking along those lines. Which left it up to her.

So she opted to put the question out there, bluntly and without further hedging.

"Remington…let's do it. Let's bait the trap at the marathon, and see if he goes for it. Maybe we'll get him, maybe we won't. But at least we'll be able to say we tried."

"You're asking me to stand on the sidelines and watch you put yourself in harm's way for my sake."

"For _our_ sake. It's no more than you would do for me, if I were in your shoes."

For a moment he seemed to be weighing the proposition. Then he turned those blue eyes on her again; to her surprise, there was a fierce gleam of humor in them. Swiftly, unexpectedly, he reached out a long arm and pulled her down to him. "Ah, Laura. We're quite the pair, aren't we? Two people endlessly vying to see which one can be more protective of the other."

"It _is_ funny, how we keep having the same fight again and again," she agreed, snuggling against him with her head on his shoulder.

"I suppose there are worse things to argue about."

"In-law trouble."

"Who gets control of the remote."

"Busting the budget over another pair of black Gucci loafers identical to the twenty pairs you already own."

"Using a Wusthof knife to loosen the rusty screws on the garbage disposal."

Not long ago she'd done exactly that, to his enormous aggravation; blushing, she had to laugh. After a beat or two, he joined in. When at last it faded she cupped his face in her two hands and raised her own so that there were only inches separating them.

"Hey," she said.

"Hm?"

"I'd lay everything on the line for you. Don't you know that by now?"

He searched her eyes. His throat worked. He mouthed, "Yes."

What followed was the best remedy she could've asked for the emotional rigors of the day, for her and especially for him: the two of them folded in each other's arms as sleep overtook them, storms quelled for the time being, disagreements navigated without tearing their relationship apart.

Even so, she never forgot for an instant that he hadn't made a decision about the Boston Marathon one way or the other.

TO BE CONTINUED


	7. PART I: Chapter 7

**A/N: Just a few quick words of apology for the delay in finishing this chapter. It's been my goal with this story to try and post every two weeks minimum or two chapters a month. The reason I've failed is that the past ten days have been devoted to caring for and then saying farewell to a beloved pet, friend and companion of 17 ½ years: the tortoiseshell cat I raised from a six-week old kitten and called Rosemary. Her decline was sudden and unexpected, her death relatively quick, although not painless. The grief is very sharp. **

**In the meantime I promise to do better with subsequent chapters. Thank you for your patience, dear readers, and for hanging in there with me. **

**~MG**

Chapter 7

Murphy's detective agency, The Michaels Group, was nothing like Laura had pictured it.

If pressed, she would've had to confess to reasons that weren't exactly flattering to her old friend. While there was no doubt Murphy was an excellent detective, it was also true that his success was more the product of persistence and application than inborn talent. Dependable, thorough, methodical to a fault: those were the phrases with which she would've reluctantly chosen to describe him. Naturally it followed that his workspace would reflect him in its low-key functionality. A tidy downtown store front or walk-up, tucked between a tax preparer's and a dry cleaner's, would've suited him to a tee.

That was why the suburban office park with its central fountain and the suggestion of rolling lawns hidden under a dusting of morning snow came as a bit of a shock.

Business was already well underway as Murphy led the Steeles into the combination foyer and reception area. A clean-cut kid with cropped dark hair and the wide shoulders of a football player greeted Murphy with a big grin from behind the front desk. "Morning, Mr. Michaels!"

"Hey, Ty, how's it going?" Murphy replied. To Laura and Remington he added: "Tyler Boggs, our intern. Second-year Justice student at UC-Denver. Any calls, Ty?"

"Three." Radiating efficiency, Tyler read from each message slip before handing it over to Murphy. "Detective Petroff from the eighth precinct…Dr. Kane from the coroner's office…a Mr. Flannery-"

"Flannery?" Remington said sharply. "Not David Flannery."

Murphy glanced up from the message. "You know him?

"If it's the same man, he dropped in on Mildred the day after Roselli's press conference."

"Did he say what he wants?" asked Laura.

"He has questions about a former associate of mine. Left a number." Murphy handed the slip to her.

One detail immediately impressed her. "Check out the area code," she said as Remington scanned the message in his turn.

"One eight hundred?"

"Interesting, huh? I'm willing to bet it's an answering service he can access from anyplace in the country. Which means there's no way to tell where he's calling from."

"Maybe I oughta sound him out, see why he's looking for you," said Murphy.

"Thanks just the same, but I'd prefer you left it alone," Remington replied.

"And why's that?"

"You're a man of sterling qualities, Murphy. Unfortunately it makes you a wretched liar, liable to let slip as much information as you gain. Not on purpose, of course. But I'd take it very much amiss if Flannery, whoever he is, was to winkle our whereabouts out of you. Especially after what we went through to make it here."

Murphy turned to Laura in disbelief. "Would you listen to this guy?"

She paused before answering. With last night's drama still painfully fresh in her memory, she shied away from the faintest suggestion that she was siding with Murphy over her husband. Besides, Remington had a point.

"He's right, Murph," she said. "The fewer people who know where we are, the better. Let's not chance it right now.

"Your decision." Despite his shrug, it was easy to tell Murphy wasn't happy about it.

But it didn't dim his enthusiasm for conducting them on a little company tour. The Michaels Group was almost twice as large as the Steele agency; soon they understood why. It consisted of two divisions, Investigations and Security. The latter supplied not only temporary and permanent security staff to its clients, but a training program that was in high demand.

"We teach ′em how a thief thinks," Murphy said. He was watching Remington with a peculiar glint in his eye. "How they look for soft spots in a building's defenses…sidestep alarm systems...little tricks they play to distract a guard's attention from his job. Then we show ′em how to outsmart ′em. Guys have come from as far away as New York to sign up."

Another example of masculine jockeying for supremacy: recognizing it, Laura winced. But Remington's self-possession was unshakable. "Your brain child, I take it?" he said to Murphy.

"How'd you guess?"

"Call it a hunch."

When they arrived at his office, whose size and furnishings subtly telegraphed his status as head of the firm, Murphy produced the box Mildred had forwarded from Los Angeles. It contained everything Laura had asked for, and a few things she hadn't. For in an envelope on the very top, removed from their frames and protected between thin sheets of cardboard, were the photos with which Remington had surprised her on Valentine's Day, one from their second wedding ceremony and four from the New Year's ball where Anna had first made her post-prison presence known.

Looking down at them, Laura was rocked by a wave of emotion too strong to be nostalgia, too general to be homesickness. It was so powerful that for a moment she couldn't think beyond it. The Fire and Ice Ball had been their public debut of sorts as a married couple, as well as her own emergence on the Los Angeles social scene as something more than "unidentified woman" or "unnamed associate", the faceless, forgettable appendage of the great detective Remington Steele. For the first time she was treated as a person of consequence, sought after, listened to. And she'd relished every heady second of it.

And yet…it was nothing in comparison to the most important ingredient of that night. Their partnership; their marriage; _him_. Devastatingly handsome as he always was in black tie, schmoozing a ballroom full of potential clients with the charm that was as effortless for him as breathing, chased by a phalanx of the city's wealthiest women but proving he only had eyes for his wife, the gentle possessiveness of his hold as he conducted her onto the dance floor, the openly passionate kiss they'd shared on the stroke of twelve…

Oh, yes, it was a special night, one she might even have called magical, if she were the kind of woman to use that word. For a handful of shining hours, she believed that everything she'd hoped to gain through her original gamble with the agency—the creation of the mythical Remington Steele—was finally hers. And by her side was a man who not only got what her dream meant to her, but was as deeply invested in its success as she.

How stupid was she, that Roselli could've snatched it out from under her with such ease?

Lost in her memories, she thought she was successfully concealing the pain that accompanied them. But once again she'd left Remington's talent for reading her out of the equation. It took his quiet "Laura?" for her to realize that the blue gaze resting on her was filled with worry.

She couldn't have spoken if she tried. Instead she fanned out the photos so he could see them. He didn't say anything, either, but the subtle shift in his expression told her he understood.

There was no time to dwell on it; Murphy was waiting. To cover she fished out the file of information they'd amassed on Roselli's masquerade as Remington Steele. "Here's what we've come up with so far," she said, and handed it over to him.

Now it was their turn, hers and Remington's, to wait. The case file was eighty pages thick, after all, and Murphy was nothing if not meticulous. For a while the room's stillness was broken only by the rustle of pages, and the occasional question he addressed to Laura.

Finally he set the file aside and looked across his desk at both Steeles. "You know…seeing it in black and white…I just now figured out what's been bugging me about this whole thing."

"Something else we've missed?" Remington's sarcasm was unabashed.

To his credit, Murphy refused to be drawn in. "Simmer down, Steele. No one's pointing fingers here. Whoever he is, Roselli's gone to a hell of a lot of trouble to get back at you for what happened in Ireland. Makes me wonder if it's really what he's after."

In all the retrospective agonizing they'd done over the loss of the agency, the one element Laura and Remington had never questioned was Roselli's motive. They exchanged a glance.

"You saw the note he sent over to our table the night he trailed us to L'Alouette," Remington said to Murphy. "He couldn't have made it any plainer."

"Sure, he threatened you. But show me where he says one word about revenge."

Remington was poised to pursue the argument; Laura elbowed him in the side. "Wait a minute, he might be on to something. Go on, Murph."

"Think about it. He already had the perfect weapon for settling the score: pinning that reporter's murder on"—Murphy gestured towards Remington—"_him_. He didn't need to become Remington Steele to do that."

"But it _was_ the only way to steal the agency from us."

"Maybe. But why bother? If he's some kind of international agent, what good is the agency to him? It doesn't track, Laura."

She struggled with that for a beat or two. He was right; there was a disconnect in logic here. Admitting it, if only to herself, gave rise to a twinge of embarrassment. Why had it taken Murphy pointing it out for her to see it?

Impatiently she brushed the feeling aside. "What you're suggesting is that he has another reason for wanting to be Remington Steele, apart from ruining Mr. Steele and me."

"I hate to say it, but-" Murphy began and then broke off.

Laura smiled ruefully. "Don't hold back on our account. Whatever it is, we can take it."

"I was gonna say it's pretty obvious he doesn't plan to stop with ruining you. But, yeah…that's exactly what I'm suggesting."

"You wouldn't also happen to have a spare theory lying around to explain his motives, would you?" asked Remington. "Idle speculation is your forte. Or it used to be."

"I can go you one better." Murphy got to his feet. "Come and meet the rest of the team. I guarantee they'll knock your socks off."

They found the others already gathered in a conference room down the hall. Circling clockwise around the table with the Steeles, Murphy made the introductions. "Samantha Delisle, our researcher and analyst...Jeff Brewer and Nick Walsh, two of our field detectives…Eli Zimmermann, our business manager…and this is my partner and big brother, Mason."

"Good to you meet you finally," Mason Michaels said, rising and extending his hand to Laura. "I've heard so much about you, I feel like I already know you."

Laura wished she could say the same, but honesty prevented her. Though she was aware Murphy had a brother, he'd never elaborated much, so this hard-muscled man with the military-style brush cut and the face weathered to a deep mahogany was a surprise. She contented herself with a brief "Nice to meet you, too," noting at the same time that he offered Remington only a perfunctory nod before resuming his seat.

She promptly forgot her unsatisfied curiosity about him as soon as Murphy opened the meeting.

It didn't take long to convince her that his people were as good as he'd promised they were. After all, as a Havenhurst trainee, she'd fraternized with the savviest detectives in the country; she recognized talent when she saw it. And she defied Alan Grievey himself to find a loser in this bunch. They were bright. They asked smart, insightful questions. Even the business manager, Eli, seemed to have an investigative background to draw from. By the time she and Remington had finished feeding them the specifics of the Roselli situation, her confidence in their abilities was soaring. Yes, the instinct that had led her to insist on coming to Denver was on target. She could trust Murphy and his associates with the welfare of the man she loved more than anything in the world.

Impulsively she reached for Remington's hand beneath the table, tightening the clasp when his long fingers curved around her own. If it was premature to declare that their nightmare was over—and it was—it was also true that a metaphorical dawn might be peeking over the horizon. She could've wept with the joy of it, except that she prided herself on rarely allowing tears to get the better of her.

Murphy for his part was steering the discussion towards the planning stages of the investigation. "The trail's a week old, so we'll have to move fast," he said. "Though I guess the time frame depends on whether the two of you are still planning on going to Boston." The last remark was directed to the Steeles.

Unwilling to risk sparking a repetition of last night's quarrel in front of Murphy, Laura had scrupulously avoided the smallest mention of the Boston Marathon. Now, put on the spot, she groped for a reply. "I don't—we haven't really-"

"Of course we are," Remington chimed in. "It's too good an opportunity to pass up. You, digging for clues in Los Angeles…us in Boston, tempting Antony to show his true colors? There's twice as much chance we'll nab him. I'd say the sooner we're off, the better."

"It should take us about a week, driving," Laura hastily explained, hiding her amazement. Whatever had prompted her husband's abrupt about-face, she wasn't about to let it go to waste. There would be plenty of opportunity to get to the bottom of it when they were alone. "That'll mean we can stop in Quinnipiac and still make the Marathon."

Murphy nodded. "In that case we'll head out today. Nick and Jeff, you're on standby. Eli? Have Barb make the reservations. Mason, think your contacts could help us out with this? Maybe we can establish whether Roselli's really an Army vet."

"Contacts?" Remington asked.

"Army Rangers, Second Battalion" said Mason. "I was with them for three tours." To Murphy he added: "Could be. I'll give it a shot."

Influenced by the freewheeling give-and-take, Laura was having a brainstorm of her own. "How would you feel about bringing Mildred on board once you get to LA, Murph? She's had almost as much exposure to Roselli as we have. Not to mention she's the one who researched the chronology for his masquerade as a detective."

"Great idea. Sam, I want you to work on finding pictures of Roselli. Last Sunday's _LA Times_ and _Trib_ should be your best bet."

"It might help to have an older picture of him, too." This suggestion came from Nick Walsh. "Just in case he changes his disguise again."

"Sorry. He stole the only pictures we had of him when he broke into our office," Laura replied.

"Nevertheless, all is not lost, Mrs. Steele." Remington reached for the pad of paper that lay near Murphy's elbow. "May I?"

"Be my guest."

It wasn't the first time Laura had witnessed such a scene: the room fallen silent, onlookers with their eyes fixed on Remington, his head bent over the pad while he sketched with bold, confident lines. Within a few minutes he was turning the sketch around so everyone could see it. And there, captured in black and white, was a flawless image of Roselli as he'd appeared in Mexico, London and Ireland.

"That's him," she announced. Remington discreetly preened.

Murphy handed the drawing off to Samantha Doyle so she could have copies made, then turned to Remington with an air of what Laura would've called respect, if she didn't know him better. "I had no idea you were an artist, Steele."

"Runs in the family," Remington said smugly. "But don't worry. I won't hold your ignorance against you."

On that note, the meeting wound down. The junior staffers began to disperse to fulfill their individual assignments. But before Murphy and the Steeles could follow, Eli Zimmerman stuck his head around the conference room door.

"Murphy, there's a Delta flight leaving for L.A. at four thirty-seven. Are we booking you along with Jeff and Nick?"

Suddenly Murphy looked uncomfortable. "Uh…I'll have an answer for you in a few minutes. Thanks, Eli."

And Laura thought: This is it. He's changed his mind about helping us. It's been years since our friendship ended; I'm asking too much from him. He never liked Remington anyway. We shouldn't have come.

There she did him an injustice. For underneath the trappings of success, the luxurious home and expensive office space, the extra pounds, the nicer clothes, and the more overt resentment of his erstwhile rival, he really was good old reliable Murphy. Her Havenhurst buddy. The brother she'd always wished she had. And he was about to prove it.

"Laura…Steele…" he began. "How'd you like some company on the ride to Boston?"

This was so counter to the conclusions she'd jumped to that it confused her. "You mean you?"

"Uh-huh."

Nonplussed, she couldn't marshal an immediate answer. What was more, it didn't escape her notice that Remington was studying Murphy with narrowed eyes. Hostile? Suspicious? It was hard to tell.

"What about Los Angeles?" he demanded.

"Nick and Jeff can handle it, trust me. They're two of our best men. And I'd kind of like to be there with you and Laura. Just in case."

An effective argument, in Laura's opinion; if Remington had shown himself in the least convinced by it, she would've accepted with gratitude. Murphy must've sensed her husband's ambivalence, too, because he was switching to persuasion mode. "Picture it, Steele. I know you can. You and me and Laura, nailing this creep and putting him behind bars…that is, if Nick and Jeff don't get to him first. It'll be like the old days."

"Waxing nostalgic, are we?"

"You gotta admit, there were times we made a damn fine team. Remember busting Veronica Kirk out of the loony bin? Or stealing the diamonds from that guy, what's-his-name? The one who framed Morrie Singer?"

"Considine. Yes, I do recall the fostering of a certain amount of—what shall I call it? Reluctant camaraderie?"

"Or how about the time I helped you break into Creighton Phillips' apartment?"

"Thereby saving Buddy Shapiro from a prison term."

"Wait a minute," Laura interjected. All at once, relegated to the sidelines as the men reminisced, she was feeling like the proverbial third wheel. "You broke into Creighton Phillips' apartment? When? And why am I just now hearing about it?"

"Should we tell her?" Murphy asked Remington.

"I seriously doubt whether she'll appreciate it."

"But we were only trying to protect her. And it was five years ago."

"Yes, and in the interval she's grown even more stubborn and hot-tempered, if you can believe it."

"Oh, I believe it, all right. The question is, when did _you_ learn to take it in stride?"

"Years of constant exposure have inured me. Not to mention enamored me."

"Would you please stop talking about me as if I wasn't in the room?" Laura snapped.

That halted their flow of repartee. It did nothing to wipe the grin from Murphy's face, however, or smooth out Remington's quirking brow. Irritated despite herself by the sudden freemasonry between them, she retreated a few steps and stood with hands on hips to consider the incident in question. It wasn't a very pleasant memory. To the contrary, her brief attraction to Phillips, a shady lawyer who'd set up his client to take the fall for a murder rap, rated only slightly less repulsive in hindsight than kissing Tony Roselli.

The two men eyed her and then looked at each other. Indiscriminately she frowned at them both. "Let me see if I've got this straight. You"-she pointed at Murphy—"helped him"—indicating Remington—"break into Creighton Phillips' apartment."

"Uh…yeah."

_"While I was there with Creighton?"_

"We thought it was for your own good," said Murphy, who was looking a trifle sheepish.

"There wouldn't have been any point otherwise, Laura," added Remington, who was not.

In fact he was enjoying himself to the hilt; there was no mistaking it. She turned the full force of her glare on him. "And I'll bet it was all your idea."

"You'd already put my warnings about Phillips down to jealousy and refused to listen to me. Who knew what nefarious course he was meditating?"

"And you were where? Skulking on the balcony? Lurking in the coat closet?"

"Under the bed, actually."

That served to illuminate certain mysterious comments Steele had let slip the following day. Hand to her forehead, she closed her eyes and groaned. "Any other secrets you two have been keeping from me for my own good?

Remington mulled it over, or pretended to. "Nothing that springs to mind." He glanced at Murphy. "You?"

"Nah."

"Good. And just so I don't have to repeat it yet again: I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself. That goes for you-" Laura was punctuating her statement with a nod at Murphy "—and _you. _Got it?"

She'd ended by gazing significantly at Remington. Undaunted, he gave Murphy a nudge. "What did I tell you? Headstrong. Volatile."

"Yep. Always has been, always will be. But we love her anyway, don't we?"

"Slow as I am at times to express it in so many words…Yes. We do."

It might only have been a reply to Murphy's offhand sally, but the softness in Remington's voice said it was much more. Laura met his eyes; the softness was there, too. And when he saw he'd captured her attention, he smiled his beautiful smile for her alone.

The private little interchange went on so long that Murphy finally interrupted by clearing his throat. "So what do you say, Steele? Am I in?"

"What? Oh, yes…Glad to welcome you aboard. Take care to remember the chain of command, though, would you? It may appear as if I'm the boss…but Laura's really the one in charge."

Not only were they bonding, they were ganging up on her again, but to Laura, it no longer mattered. Neither did her resolve to tax Remington with his change of heart about Boston. She'd won her point; she'd carried the day; she'd talked him around to her point of view. And she was far too prudent a woman not to quit when she was ahead. After all: what reason for agreeing could he possibly have, other than the desire to please his wife?

That was a question it didn't occcur to her to pursue, not then.

Though perhaps it should have.

* * *

Bright and early the next day, the Fleetwood pulled up into the Michaels' long driveway. Out of the house came Murphy with his family, a backpack and a duffel bag. He swept Zack up and off his feet, and then Alex, and knelt and hugged them both. Last of all he kissed Sherry, longest and most fervently. The Steeles tactfully looked the other way.

Soon enough he was tossing his bags through the door of the RV and clambering in after them. "Ah, Murphy," Remington greeted him from behind the wheel. "Ready to join us on our quest? And rekindle the old esprit de corps?"

Murphy snorted. "How come I don't remember him so chipper first thing in the morning?" he asked Laura.

"Because he isn't so chipper in the morning, usually. Coffee? There's some fresh in the galley."

"Thanks."

None of them noticed the dark blue sedan waiting for them just outside Murphy's subdivision, or that it tailed them to the southbound interstate, where it proceeded to maintain a steady speed three car-lengths' behind them.

Its driver was to stick with them under various guises all the way to Boston.

TO BE CONTINUED


	8. PART I: Chapter 8

**A/N: Just a quick note to thank everyone who added expressions of sympathy to their reviews of chapter 7, and/or contacted me via PM. There are no words to express how much I appreciate your kindness.**

**~MG**

Chapter 8

It was while driving through southeastern Kansas that Murphy realized he'd begun to think maybe Laura was right.

Maybe Steele _was_ good for her.

Five words he never imagined he would ever, ever think, much less say. After all, he was the one who, on receiving the invitation to Laura's wedding and discovering she was getting married to Steele, had announced glumly to Sherry: "She's making the biggest mistake of her life."

His wife had directed a quizzical look at him over Alex's five-month-old head. It was time for the twins' evening feeding, and he was in the rocking chair opposite hers with Zack grizzling in his arms. They didn't have any secrets from each other, him and Sherry, not where their love lives were concerned; she knew all about his history with Laura and how Steele had totally wrecked his hopes in that area. Sherry knew in detail about Steele's inability to commit, his wanderlust, his womanizing and his overall deficit in the morality department.

So it had surprised Murphy a bit when she replied, "You really think so?"

"He's only gonna make her miserable. Use her til he's gotten what he wants out of her and then leave her flat. It's how guys like him operate."

"Mm-hm." She sat quietly rocking, and he assumed she'd abandoned the subject until she pointed out, "That's exactly what you said about him four years ago. And they're still together." Shifting Alex in her arms, she'd added, "Looks like this little fella's had enough."

It was the signal for Murphy to launch an expert maneuver in which he exchanged fussy Zack for his sleepy, replete brother. "And that makes it okay for Laura to throw herself away on someone who'll only break her heart?" he asked once he'd resumed his seat and Alex was tucked securely in the crook of his elbow.

"From what I saw of her, she's not the kind of woman to let her partner walk all over her, before or after they're married."

"Love makes people do stupid things, things they wouldn't ordinarily do."

"Honey. It's been four years since you've seen them. Isn't there a chance he could've changed?"

Murphy had insisted there wasn't, and listed the reasons why. "And I'm not gonna stand by and watch. Unh-unh. No way."

"You mean skip the wedding? Laura would be so hurt."

He didn't have to say out loud that it served her right for marrying a jerk like Steele; his glower and stubborn silence said it for him.

Sherry had sighed, a gentle, tolerant sigh. "Well, think it over. Maybe after you sleep on it you'll see it differently."

That was the only conversation they had about Laura and Steele's wedding. A day or so later he'd followed Sherry's advice. He thought about it. For about two seconds. Then he sat down and wrote a curt refusal to Laura, tacking on a postscript in which he'd issued a warning to Steele. 'Behave yourself and make her happy, or I'll break your face,' he'd said. Maybe it would put the fear of God into Steele, maybe it wouldn't, but he couldn't have worded it any plainer than that.

The sight of Steele sauntering up his driveway ten months later, so nonchalant and devil-may-care you never would've guessed he was a wanted fugitive who'd lost his wife her business, had pissed Murphy off enough to keep his promise. He'd hauled off and slugged him. And man, he couldn't believe how good it felt.

Not for long. As soon as Laura related the litany of circumstances in which Steele had come through for her over the years, he'd begun to regret his hot-headedness. Now that he'd joined the Steeles on their trek to Boston he felt even stupider. Because, like it or not, the evidence was piling up. And it all pointed to a single conclusion.

Laura hadn't talked herself into seeing what wasn't there. She wasn't fooling herself. Steele _had_ changed.

The first night on the road was when Murphy got his first glimpse of the new Steele, the one Laura had told him about but he couldn't quite wrap his mind around. He was beginning to understand why: you had to be in close proximity with Steele to spot it. On the surface he was the same smooth operator who used to set Murphy's teeth perpetually on edge with his glibness and smarmy charm. The guy you couldn't embarrass or get the better of in an argument. The guy whose armor you couldn't dent no matter how hard you tried.

Steele's plan was to head straight through to Connecticut with as few overnight stops as possible along the way, dividing the driving into three eight-hour shifts. He would take the graveyard shift, midnight to eight in the morning, because, he explained, it would allow him to accompany Laura on her morning run before turning in for some rest. For Laura the schedule was as close to her normal daytime rhythm as possible, ten a.m. until late afternoon or early evening and eight hours' sleep afterwards. Murphy was to cover the time slot between her and Steele.

Apparently Steele had brainstormed the arrangements without soliciting Laura's input, and over the dinner he'd competently produced in the RV's galley, she peppered her husband with objections. She could pull her weight on the night shift the same as the men, and she didn't need to be coddled like she was some delicate flower, she'd be just fine working out by herself, thank you very much, and who did he think he was, anyway, dictating to her?

Murphy had expected fireworks of the sort that erupted constantly between the two while he was still with the agency. Instead Steele let her run on without interruption, listening to her with a half-smile playing around his lips. At length her frustrated sigh said she'd run out of steam. "I know, I know, you don't have to tell me," she'd grumbled. "You're putting your foot down."

There was a faint but audible note of amusement in Steele's reply. "Precisely."

Laura had absorbed it for a moment. Then she'd turned her attention back to her food. The argument was over.

Murphy couldn't believe it! Grudging admiration for Steele filled him. Secretly he'd always envied the masterful attitude Steele had adopted towards Laura almost from the beginning of their personal relationship. He'd even tried to imitate it once or twice, with results that were damn embarrassing. Oh, Laura hadn't said much those times he'd substituted a command for his usual tentative requests; she'd only raised her eyebrows, changed the subject and went on as if nothing had happened. But he heard the message loud and clear. The only guy she'd allow to take such liberties was Steele. Nobody else could get away with the bossiness she put up with from him-bossiness that was a product of Steele's huge ego, refusing to knuckle under to a woman.

Or was it? For Murphy had failed to detect any sign that Steele considered marriage an excuse to throw his weight around. If anything Steele deferred more willingly to Laura when it came to the business, abiding by her decisions, following her lead. In making his current point he was firm but not overbearing, the man of the family but no tyrant. Not only did Laura not seem to resent it, she'd taken it in stride.

Incredible.

After the table was cleared and the dishes put away, Steele rummaged in a leather portfolio for what looked like a sketchpad and slipped out the door. "It's his way of unwinding," Laura told Murphy. "It's been over a week since he's had the chance to work."

"He used to unwind by playing the ponies and watching campy old movies."

"He still does. This is different. He's serious about being an artist. Usually he's very disciplined. He just needs to get back into his routine."

Steele serious about something besides theft and chicanery? And self-disciplined, with a routine? Afraid his cynicism would show, Murphy said hastily, "When he mentioned yesterday about it running in the family. Was he telling the truth?"

"Every word. One of his great-uncle's paintings is on permanent exhibit in a museum at Cambridge University. There was another relative in the nineteenth century who illustrated birdwatcher guides. And Remington's cousin Robbie is a successful graphic designer in London."

"Do you think he'd be mad if—?" Murphy gestured towards the portfolio Steele had left behind.

"A little. But flattered, too, though I know he'd deny it."

She peered down at the portfolio with him as he leafed slowly through the pages. They were as big a surprise as the resolution of the Steeles' quarrel. Even with no knowledge of art to speak of, it was obvious Steele was talented. His drawings had clarity and depth and meaning. And you could recognize what you were looking at.

Which, among others, was sketch after sketch of Laura.

Yeah, it was Laura, no mistake about that…but Laura as he'd never seen her before, with a luminous quality that grabbed the imagination and wouldn't let go. Every line, every curve, every shadow worked together to convey an overall impression of unique beauty. There's no other woman on earth like her, it said. This woman is very, very special.

It stuck him suddenly that what Steele had captured over and over was the vision of Laura he carried inside.

He couldn't have been more embarrassed by this display of Steele's devotion if he'd interrupted them, Steele and Laura, in the midst of physical intimacy. His face burned. To hide it from Laura he shut the portfolio and re-fastened its buckles, as if protecting Steele's secret from prying eyes.

Laura seemed to have noticed nothing unusual in his behavior. "He's good, isn't he?" she asked, beaming.

"Yeah, he is."

That was when Murphy thought for the first time: maybe I haven't given him enough credit. Maybe she's right, and he really does care about her. And he set himself to figure out if Steele was faking.

The days that followed offered him plenty of opportunity. Within the Fleetwood's close quarters, the three of them quickly fell into a pattern that didn't diverge too far from the one Steele had originally suggested. While Murphy and Laura slept-she in the bedroom, he on the pull-out sofa outside the galley-Steele drove through the wee hours of the morning. Laura got up around five a.m. to keep her husband company. As soon as the sun rose he parked the RV so they could run together, though how Steele managed to keep pace with Laura, Murphy never asked. He was usually showered and dressed by the time they got back and in response to Laura's standing request would take the wheel so she could clean up and change. Within half an hour she would emerge from the bedroom and pick up her shift, ceding the late afternoon to midnight run to Murphy. Steele would absent himself for a bit to see her off to bed and then spend a few hours in the galley bent over his sketchbook. There the cycle would repeat itself.

They were practically living in each others' back pockets—great for rebuilding the old team spirit Steele had joked about on departure day, not so great for privacy. If the old Steele was there just under the surface, he'd eventually rear his ugly head. He'd have to. Not even a con man as good as Steele could keep up the masquerade twenty-four-seven.

If he suspected he was under scrutiny, Steele never let on. He went about his business with the relentless good cheer Murphy remembered, amazingly efficient in handling the RV's routine maintenance, escorting Laura on her daily runs, cooking dinner, often going the extra mile, no pun intended, when it came to the driving. His attitude towards Murphy was amiable crossed with a hint of standoffishness. That suited Murphy fine. They were putting up with each other for Laura's sake, the way they had for that year at the agency. He no more wanted to pretend they were best buddies or trade confidences than Steele did.

He never would've done it if Laura hadn't begged him to.

Okay, so maybe "begged" was too strong a term. He wouldn't have made her go to those lengths, anyway. But she did enter the RV's cabin on the morning of day four with an expression that transported him straight back to the fall of 'eighty-two. She'd worn that wrinkle between her brows too often for him to forget it, or which conniving con man was its instigator.

"Murph," she said as he pulled to side of the road so she could take his place in the driver's seat, "have you noticed anything…off…about Remington?"

How should he know? He'd been too busy trying to figure out who "Remington" was nowadays to distinguish what was out-of the-ordinary behavior and what wasn't. But he couldn't admit that to Laura. "Nope. What makes you ask?"

"I'm afraid he's up to something."

_That_ was the Steele who lived in Murphy's memory. He chuckled as he settled in on the passenger side and Laura got them underway. "If he is, he sure picked a funny place for it. The middle of the boondocks? How much trouble can he get in here?"

There was no answering laugh from Laura. "Come on, it was a joke," he said. "Where's your sense of humor?"

She turned those big brown eyes on him then. Only for an instant, since she was driving. But that was all it took. The happiness they'd found in their respective marriages notwithstanding, he would do whatever was in his power to erase the distress from Laura's eyes, just like he always tried to in the old days.

"He caved too easily about this trip," she replied. "That was the first clue. One minute he was throwing a fit, then all of a sudden he couldn't wait to get started. And he's been hinting around that maybe I won't need to run the marathon after all. I wouldn't have thought much about it, except…just now, while he was in the shower…I found his gun in the bedroom, hidden. It wasn't there yesterday."

He had to confess he still didn't see the problem.

"I'm almost afraid to say it out loud, you know? Like if I do, I'll make it real. But I get the feeling he's planning to take matters with Roselli into his own hands."

"Into his own hands. Vigilante justice? _Steele_?" He struggled to stifle his laughter before she took offense.

She heard it anyway, and threw him a reproachful glance. "The idea isn't as far-fetched as you might think."

"Well, what did he say when you confronted him?" When she hesitated, he added: "You _did_ confront him, Laura."

"I can't."

"How come?"

In the pause that followed, he noted her grip on the steering wheel, tighter than it should have been. "It's…complicated," she said. "I don't think he'll tell me the truth."

Murphy sat back to mull that over. There was a lot of sub-text, none of it difficult to translate. Somewhere along the line—how far back wasn't clear—Roselli had provoked Steele, and Steele had responded by—what? Hunting the other man down? Pulling a gun? Why else would Laura be so afraid he was considering a repeat performance?

But what had set him off in the first place? Laura had omitted it from both her recitations of the Roselli saga the night she and Steele arrived in Denver. That meant two things: a, it was big; b, someone had something to hide. Her? Steele? Both?

Gently, diplomatically, because this was Laura, and he couldn't stand to upset her, he probed those issues.

She continued to stonewall. "I'd fill in the details if I could. But it's not my story to tell."

"Protecting him like always, huh, partner? I figured as much."

"_He's_ protecting _me_, Murph."

That statement was beyond his ability to decode. He blinked. "You lost me."

"I made a horrible misjudgment last year. It's what started this whole mess. Only he blames himself. He's decided it's his mission to put it right, paying the price for my stupidity. I've talked and talked til I'm blue in the face, but you know him. He's a master of the art of selective hearing."

She was laughing a little as she said it, fond, rueful laughter; it seemed safe to smile back. At least she doesn't have as many illusions about him as she used to, he thought. That's something.

To her he said: "What can I do to help?"

It was then that he asked him for the biggest favor yet, but how could he say no? Sound Remington out, she said. See if you can get a sense of what he's planning. Talk him out of it if you can. Running underneath like a counterpoint was what she didn't say: help me keep him safe, because I can't live without him.

"I'll do my best."

"Thanks, Murph. I knew I could count on you." Keeping one eye on traffic, she leaned over swiftly to kiss his cheek.

Fully half an hour passed before the glow from that kiss faded, and it occurred to him to wonder why the hell, in spite of all the water under the bridge, it should still be potent enough to operate on him as equal parts incentive and reward.

TO BE CONTINUED


	9. PART I: Chapter 9

Chapter 9

"Whenever you're ready to change over, give us a shout, eh, Murphy?" said Steele, poking his head into the Fleetwood's cabin.

According to the nifty dashboard clock, it was only ten p.m.—two hours before Steele was scheduled to take over the driving, more than twelve hours after Murphy's conversation with Laura. His first impulse was to turn Steele's offer down. Then, recognizing it just in time as an opening he could use, he changed his mind.

"Good idea," he replied. He had to raise his voice slightly to be heard over the rain beating on the roof and windshield. "Let me find somewhere I can stop."

Steele offered no objection, so Murphy kept his eyes peeled for a convenient spot along the highway. It was slow going, had been for hours, thanks to storms that had blown in from the west that afternoon and mired them in central Indiana when they could've conceivably crossed the Kentucky border before sundown. More rain was predicted tomorrow; it was still coming down in wind-whipped sheets.

Which only grew worse. "Maybe we should call it a night," Murphy suggested after fifteen minutes of fruitless crawling along with the high beams alight and the wipers slapping at top speed.

"And fall behind schedule? Nonsense. I've driven through much worse than this in the Himalayan foothills during monsoon season and come to no harm."

But by the time the Fleetwood's headlights illuminated a relatively safe harbor—the parking lot of a service station that was already closed—even Steele had to admit the elements had bested them. "It's as good a camp site as any, I suppose," he said, shrugging into a leather jacket and clapping a newsboy's cap on his head. "Off to batten down the hatches."

"Need a hand?"

"Just leave a light in the window for me." And Steele ducked out into the storm.

As soon as he was gone, Murphy swung into action. He had plans of his own to initiate-only his had nothing to do with the weather, and everything to do with fulfilling his promise to Laura. His strategy: a little casual male bonding with her husband. His goal: matching wits with Steele again. Extracting the truth from him so craftily, he'd never realize he'd been played until it was too late. The secret weapon? A nicely aged bottle of Maker's Mark, acquired that very afternoon in a fit of deviousness that would've done Steele proud.

The distinctive oblong bottle had spent the day hidden in Murphy's duffel bag. Now he retrieved it and broke the seal. For a minute he was afraid he'd have to resort to serving fine whiskey in plastic tumblers—a fallback position that bordered on sacrilege!—but a search through every cabinet in the galley was rewarded with the discovery of four jelly glasses. Along with a bag of ice, bowls of potato chips and peanuts and the bottle of Maker's Mark, he set two of them on the table and sat down to wait for Steele.

Houston, we have ignition, Murphy thought, and grinned.

It was a good thing he'd worked quickly. A few minutes more, and a chilly gust of wind heralded Steele's return. He slammed the door behind him, already shedding his soaked jacket and cap and shaking excess water out of his hair. But his steps slowed noticeably at the sight of the spread Murphy had put together. And his cool slipped just enough to reveal his surprise.

Catching Steele at a disadvantage was a rare experience for Murphy; he found himself privately gloating. But all he said was: "Join me? Nothing better on a night like this than a shot of good Kentucky bourbon."

Steele didn't answer right away. Murphy thought it was because Steele was studying him, trying to figure out his angle, though he couldn't be absolutely positive since he was avoiding Steele's eyes. He was also fighting back a burst of laughter. Role-reversal, he was finding, was a hell of a lot of fun.

At last Steele said, "Be with you in a moment."

Actually he spent more like ten minutes changing into dry clothes, but who was counting? In the interval Murphy availed himself of the opportunity to pour out the liquor: a bare inch for Steele, closer to two fingers for himself. The first mouthful was going down, smooth and mellow, when Steele plopped down in the seat opposite him.

He'd transformed back into Mr. Savoir Faire, reaching for the bourbon bottle and examining its label. "Not my usual, but I wager it'll do."

"What _is_ your usual?"

"These days? Nismes-Delclou Armagnac, 1957. Unfortunately."

"Why unfortunately?"

"At two hundred dollars a bottle, it's an expensive indulgence." Steele took a sip; his brows lifted in appreciation. "Stimulating."

Murphy added another draught to Steele's glass, topped off his own, and held it aloft in a toast. "Cheers."

"Chin-chin."

Glass clinked on glass.

"And to think all these years I had you pegged as a Budweiser aficionado," said Steele.

"Real Kentuckians only settle for beer when they run out of bourbon."

"I'm beginning to understand why."

They drank again.

"I never knew you were from Kentucky, Murphy."

"Yep. Until I was ten. Then my dad got transferred to Colorado."

"Businessman?"

"Career Army. I was what's known as a military brat."

"I'm familiar with the term. Pass the crisps."

"The whats?"

Steele indicated the bowl of Lay's. Murphy slid it towards him. "Here in America we call them 'chips'."

"Do you? Must make a note of it for the future."

It wasn't the tone of his voice, which was bland, but the itinerant spark of mirth in his eye that revealed that Steele knew the American word perfectly well, he was only pretending he didn't to get a rise out of Murphy. The gambit wasn't as annoying as it could have been. The bourbon was doing the job it was supposed to, defusing potential conflict between incompatible personalities.

"_The Great Santini_," Steele remarked between bites of potato chip_. _"Robert Duvall, Blythe Danner, Warner Brothers, 1979. An adolescent boy struggles to understand his father, a wild card of a Marine colonel."

"I remember it, yeah."

"How does it rate as a portrait of growing up in the military? Pure dramatic license? Or fairly accurate?"

"Accurate. At least some of it. The stuff about moving around and leaving friends behind, starting over in a new town-that was right on. My dad wasn't a hell-raiser, though. More the strong, stiff-upper-lip type, like"—Murphy groped for a comparison Steele could relate to—"Gary Cooper. Or Gregory Peck."

"_Sergeant York_. _Twelve O'Clock High_.

"You got the picture."

"And soldiering runs in your family. Your father…your brother Mason…"

"…my uncles, my cousins, my grandfather, his father…Officer corps. All the way back to the Civil War."

"But you broke with tradition."

"I always knew I wasn't cut out for West Point. Familiar with that term?"

"Army academy?"

"Right. Besides, I wanted to be a doctor. I guess you could say I was the rebel of the family."

Steele was eying him keenly. "Ah. That explains it."

"What?"

"Your fondness for the coroner's office."

"Very funny."

There was a pause. "What stopped you? Eh?" asked Steele, tipping his glass outward in the universal signal for a refill.

"From applying to med school?" It wasn't a memory Murphy was proud of; ordinarily Steele would've been the last man with whom he would share it. "I didn't have the math grades. Too busy playing sports. What a loser, huh?"

He stole a sheepish look at Steele, and was surprised to find not a trace of mockery in the other man's face. "Perhaps it just wasn't meant to be," Steele suggested. "And you're serving the common welfare all the same as a detective, aren't you? There are people resting easier in their beds tonight because of the work you've done."

"I never thought of it like that before. Uh…thanks."

There the conversation lapsed briefly in a glow of mutual good will. In the midst of pelting rain and blustering wind, its heaters humming and lamps lit and with sustenance near at hand, the RV was a good place to be, Murphy thought. And Steele was turning out to be unexpectedly pleasant company. It almost made him wish the two of them had tried hanging out together while he was still living in Los Angeles. Close on that revelation followed another: for the first time since Steele and Laura had appeared on his doorstep, he was no longer regarding Steele through the lens of hostility and suspicion, but of provisional friendship.

Steele must've picked up the vibe, for suddenly he said: "Of course, there's another consideration that should reconcile you to your failure to become a doctor."

"What's that?"

"Your boys. If you'd chosen another path, you might never have had them. They're a fine pair, Murphy. It's plain you've a knack for fatherhood.

He seemed so sincere, so genuine, that Murphy couldn't help responding with a grin. "I'm learning. It's true what they say, you know. Having kids changes you in ways you can't begin to imagine until you're actually living it."

"Such as-?"

"Your attitude towards work, to start with. Your kids are totally dependent on you, so you go out and do your best every day for their sake. You'd cut off your right arm, go barefoot and hungry and thirsty, to make sure they're warm and fed and dry. You want to fight to make the world a better place because they're in it-"

Abruptly he stopped: it had occurred to him he was babbling like an idiot, wearing his heart on his sleeve in front of Steele. What was he, _nuts_?

"Probably sounds corny to you," he muttered, and gulped a huge, bracing swig of bourbon.

"Far from it. I appreciate the candor. The fact is, Laura and I…" Now it was Steele who was letting his sentence meander and die and averting his gaze. "Well. We've just decided it's time to have a go at parenthood ourselves."

Murphy stared. "No kidding. Is she-"

"No, she's not. No doubt it's for the best, given our situation. But once we've dispatched Roselli… and put this behind us…"

He was acting so much like a normal guy—pleased, kind of proud, slightly embarrassed-that Murphy warmed towards him even more. Sure, there was a momentary twinge of melancholy at the prospect of Laura having someone else's baby. But a surge of fellow-feeling for Steele, almost brotherly, swept it away. The other stuff was the past; this was here and now; and maybe he and Steele had more in common than he ever imagined!

"Steele, that's the best damn news I've heard all day."

"It is?"

"You bet it is. You're gonna be a father! A father, Steele! That calls for a toast."

"Call me a wet blanket, but aren't you being a tad premature? Laura isn't expecting yet."

"Who cares? We'll drink to it anyway. No reason to put it off, right? Or let good bourbon go to waste."

"Not in my book, there isn't."

"Now you're talking." Tawny liquor burbled and splashed into their glasses. "To fatherhood. Present and future."

"Fatherhood."

It was a raucous, laughing toast, and immediately they drained it, Murphy was serving them another round. "Man, if only we had some cigars. We could celebrate-"

"What's going on?" cut in a new voice: Laura's.

Steele started; so did Murphy. They'd both totally forgotten about Laura, who'd gone to bed hours ago. Sad to say, her entrance spoiled the congenial mood. Steele and Murphy looked at her and then exchanged a guilty glance, as if they'd been caught out in some low-down masculine skullduggery.

She didn't appear the least accusatory, though, just mildly questioning, and advanced a couple more steps towards them. Even with sleep-tousled hair and no make-up, she was so pretty, her cute little figure flattered by silk pajamas in a swirly pattern of green and violet and blue…

And she's also Steele's wife, Murphy reminded himself, tearing his eyes away and slamming the lid on that line of thought, hopefully forever.

"What's going on? Why've we stopped?" she was saying.

"Because, my love, not only is it dark as Egypt out there, it's raining cats and dogs, if you'll forgive the mixed metaphors. Better not to risk an accident." As he spoke Steele uncoiled his length from the chair and got to his feet. "Murphy was kind enough to provide a little cheer to ward off the chill."

Laura's smiling gaze had already taken in the table and its contents. "I can see that. Still drinking Maker's, huh, Murph?"

Only a throwaway comment, but invested with the power to recall the past, hours spent sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with Laura in some bar, talking shop. Back then he used to watch her on the sly, enthralled, wondering how a girl so utterly feminine you didn't forget it for a second managed to be as good a drinking buddy as a man. Probably she hadn't changed; if Murphy invited her to sit down with them now, he'd be able to judge for himself.

He didn't do it. He couldn't have explained exactly why, except it struck him as awkward, not to mention disloyal. It took a minute to figure out it wasn't Sherry he was worried about betraying.

Opening the circle to Laura, busting up the all-male camaraderie, would be disloyal…to _Steele_.

He'd definitely had too much bourbon. And how.

Unnerved, he said hastily to Laura, "Yeah, I am, but I think I've reached my limit. Steele? Thanks for the company. It was, uh, interesting."

If Steele was insulted by the graceless brush-off, it didn't show. All he said was, "The thanks are on my side. Can I help clear away?" And after Murphy said no, he had it covered, Steele ushered Laura to the bedroom with a hand riding at the small of her back, tossing a careless 'good night' over his shoulder.

It wasn't until he'd sought his own makeshift sofa bed—dishes and glasses washed and put away, the bourbon stowed in his duffel again, lights out—that Murphy remembered he hadn't achieved the most important item on his agenda.

He hadn't even taken a stab at it.

He let out a muffled groan. So much for his genius plan. Wasn't the object to loosen Steele's tongue by means of alcohol? And divest him of his secret, if he had one? Instead he'd turned the tables, deflecting attention to Murphy, drawing him to talk about himself. And he was so good at it, Murphy never noticed he was being trumped. Hell, he'd actually _enjoyed_ it.

Lying on his back with his arms crossed behind his head, he tried to pinpoint where he'd gone wrong. His starting premise was faulty, he decided; he shouldn't have resorted to head games. It was a dumb mistake, given that lies and subterfuge were Steele's territory, his natural element, the very air he breathed. In that respect Murphy was totally outclassed. No wonder Steele had faked him out so neatly. Even when he wasn't consciously playing, he was guided by a combination of pure instinct and habit.

The road to success demanded Murphy play to his own strengths, not Steele's. Or at least level the playing field somehow. Think: what advantage did he have on his side that Steele didn't?

Slowly it dawned on him. Unlike Steele, he didn't dance around the truth—a circumstance Steele had needled him about just a few days ago. "You're a man of sterling integrity," he'd said, "but a wretched liar." Like it was a quality to be ashamed of! Murphy might have decked him for the sarcasm in his tone, except they were in the middle of his offices, and he had to set an example for his employees.

Honesty. Candor. Transparency. Maybe they didn't seem like much. But they were the best weapons a guy could have in his arsenal, when all was said and done.

It was time to see how the new Steele—assuming he actually existed—handled them.

* * *

The next day's weather continued to be the kind no one but the weathermen could love. Vindicating their predictions, the storm front sat sullenly over Indiana and western Kentucky, refusing to budge before it had dumped its full complement of rain. There were two options for dealing with it: sit and wait for it to pass, or slog through it. In the light of day, with Laura at the helm, the Steeles and Murphy chose the latter course.

Murphy had awakened that morning dreading the moment when he'd have to break the news to Laura that he'd made no headway with Steele. It was a measure of how much he hated to disappoint her, that sinking feeling in his gut. He was right: her face did fall at first. But she rallied at his promise to try again. He walked away from the conversation wishing glumly that he had as much confidence in himself as she obviously had in him.

As midnight rolled around, and Steele came striding from the bedroom towards the RV's cabin, he was still racking his brain for a way to introduce the subject of Tony Roselli.

"Laura asleep?" was his lame inspiration.

"As soon as her head hit the pillow. It's all the exercise, I suspect."

"She's really getting into this prep for the Marathon."

"So much so you'd think she'll be racing to win, instead of playing decoy. But that's our Laura. Throws herself completely into whatever role she's taken on."

Relieved of his post at the wheel, Murphy indulged in a joint-popping stretch and folded himself into the passenger seat. Though Steele didn't comment, he broke his concentration on the road long enough to slant him an unreadable look.

Murphy pretended not to see it. The conversation was headed in the general direction he was hoping for; he had no intention of repeating last night's error, allowing it to slip out of his control. "I remember this one case," he said. "Industrial espionage. Laura was posing as a secretary, feeding the spy false information. We planted a bug in a cheap motel room so she could invite him over for a drink and—you know."

"Seduce him into giving himself away?"

"You got it. My job was to listen in from the room next door. Tape recorder, headphones, the whole nine yards."

"I think I may have blundered into that very set-up. Your standard scenario in those days, wasn't it?"

"We used it a couple of times. I always hated it, though. The listening part."

"Try standing three feet away while she's pretending to be in the throes of passion with a notorious playboy in the stateroom of his million-dollar yacht."

"I bet it was hard to watch."

"Excruciating, actually."

"So…is that what went on with this Roselli character?"

The abruptness of the transition was deliberate. Murphy sat back to appraise its effect. In the intermittent light from the tall lamps the Fleetwood was passing under, the ones that illuminated the interstate, Steele's face had a saturnine cast, shadowed by the close-clipped beard and mustache he'd worn since his arrival in Denver. When he finally replied, his voice matched his expression, grim, guarded. "Why do you ask?"

"I get the feeling Laura was holding something back the other night, something major."

"Perhaps you ought to take it up with her."

"She says she made a bad misjudgment. She also says it's not her story to tell." Murphy paused, holding Steele's attention. "She's worried about the gun she found in your bedroom."

"Is she, indeed."

Steele could've been carved from stone, he was sitting so still. That was confirmation to Murphy that his suspicions were justified. A man only needed to exercise that level of self-control if he had something monumental to hide. This was the moment to pull out all the stops in persuading Steele to confess whatever it was.

So Murphy leaned towards him in the friendliest manner possible. "Level with me, Steele. You're not the kind who goes around shooting people. You didn't used to be, anyway. Steal his wallet, maybe. Swindle him out of his life savings. But not murder."

Another inscrutable glance from Steele. Murphy turned up the pressure. "What is it about this guy? What's Laura so afraid of? "

"Exactly what she told you. He's a filthy, murdering swine who hurts women."

"And?"

Steele sighed and scrubbed a hand over his jaw, his stance loosening and shoulders sagging. "And I wasn't there at the outset, so I'm not certain of all the particulars. What I do know is, he showed up in Mexico, on the first leg of our honeymoon. He just 'happened' to be on the scene when Laura ran into a spot of trouble and I was…unavoidably detained elsewhere."

"So he _was_ after her."

"Officially, he was after me. Needed my help in nabbing that double agent we told you about, Helmsley. Or so he led us to believe. The part where Roselli fingered me as a credible go-between? That much is true. But there was an added…incentive…that made helping him attractive. Though as it turns out, I was more expendable than he let on."

"And unofficially?"

"Of course he wanted her, or pretended to. And stopped at nothing to get her. Outright seduction to begin with. When that backfired, meddling in the circumstances of our marriage. Either way, there's an old-fashioned word to describe what he was up to. 'Cuckold'. Heard of it, have you?"

"Sure."

"It's what he tried to make me into on our honeymoon."

That was an assertion Murphy couldn't quite accept. "C'mon, Steele. We're talking Laura here. She hasn't so much as looked at another guy since the minute Agent Pierson walked into her office. I was there, remember?"

"Yes, well, we've since concluded he was only using her to provoke me. Why, we still don't know. And when ultimately it didn't work he tried…other avenues."

He swallowed and was silent. And it was then that the equation began to add up for Murphy. Laura's trepidation. Steele, whose hatred of guns was vocal and unstinting, suddenly turned would-be vigilante. Windsor Thomas and Glady Lynch and Roselli 'a murdering swine who hurts women'.

It nearly killed him to say it out loud, but what else could he do? "He hurt her. Didn't he?"

The lines in Steele's face seemed to deepen. "Not that way, if you're insinuating what I think you are. He'd have been in his grave months ago if he had." His mouth twisted; his next words were harsh and difficult, as if he was forcing them out against his will. "That time he broke into the agency and ransacked it? Laura surprised him at it."

"So he-"

"-Bashed her over the head, knocked her unconscious. Put his hands on her afterwards. Took _photograph_s…"

By now Steele's anguish was palpable, mostly because he'd stopped struggling to hide it. Too raw for Murphy, who closed his eyes against it. But the image persisted anyway: Laura injured, handled cruelly and callously by a soulless murderer, because in Roselli's mind she was less than nothing, negligible, an insignificant chip in some twisted poker game….

If Murphy couldn't bear to think of it—and he couldn't—how had Steele stood it all these months?

"Ah, God," he whispered.

Now that he'd started with the confidences, Steele couldn't seem to stop. "It was me that found her. He left her lying in her office-just lying there, like a little doll somebody'd broken and tossed aside. At first I couldn't find her pulse…and then it took ages to wake her up…"

Unaccountably, he laughed. It wasn't a winning sound. This was a side of Steele Murphy had never glimpsed before. Maybe it didn't exist until he married Laura.

"You should've seen her when she did," Steele was saying. "Flat out determined she was going to sort out the mess he'd left behind and tear off after him…Meanwhile she couldn't even stand. That's how hard he hit her."

"That's our Laura, all right."

"Who's now proposing to open herself to another attack. From the frying pan into the fire, as it were."

The statement was ironical and dry as dust, damming up the flow of emotion. But once again, its very starkness told Murphy what he needed to know. "My God, she's right," he said slowly. "You _are _planning to go after him."

For the first time, Steele's temper flared. "What else would you have me do, eh? What would you do in my shoes?"

"Leave it to the authorities."

"They've been looking for almost six months, those precious authorities of yours. They've turned up neither hide nor hair of him."

"Then give my guys a crack at it."

"The Marathon's less than two weeks away. Can you swear to me they'll have found evidence against him by then? Hm?"

Compelled to honesty, Murphy was silent.

Something that looked a lot like defiance glittered in Steele's eyes. "She's _my_ wife, Murphy—mine to protect, when she'll let me. She'll not end up like Windsor Thomas or Gladys Lynch, not Laura. Not unless I've drawn my last breath, she won't. You don't like it, the idea of me getting him before he gets to her? Because I bloody well know _she_ doesn't. Too damn bad."

He'd finished his piece. His jaw clamped tight on it; he bent his gaze on the road and didn't look at Murphy again. Clearly in his opinion the subject was closed.

And there Murphy had it, the proof he'd been waiting for: the new Steele in the flesh, just the way Laura had described him. Pleased to finally meet you, pal, Murphy was tempted to say, and had to resist giving vent to a snort of inappropriate laughter.

Instead he got up to leave. Then, indecisive, he turned back towards Steele. More than a physical movement, as he would recognize later, it was the moment when his allegiance shifted, at least in this situation.

He said: "Steele. You're not jumping into this half-cocked, right? You're gonna take some time, put together a strategy, before you make your move?"

"What's it to you? Planning to report to Laura? Eh?" It was a surly growl.

"Unless I miss my guess you're gonna need back up, and it looks like I'm it."

"I don't recall requesting you."

"I'm offering anyway." Very low he added: "I love her, too, you know."

There was a long silence.

"I haven't thought that far ahead," Steele said at last. "Depends on what happens in Connecticut, I suppose. I'll not object to your…input…if it's still on offer." Unexpectedly his right hand shot out to close around Murphy's wrist in an iron grasp. "Not a breath of this to Laura, mate."

Murphy grinned. "She'll have to read about it in the papers when we get him, same as everyone else."

"Your hand on it, then."

Their palms met. They shook.

Thus in the spirit of their Creighton Phillips caper did the two men who loved her best seal their second conspiracy to protect Laura without her knowledge.

TO BE CONTINUED


	10. PART I: Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Laura was the one who spotted the tail.

By now the Roselli hunters had discovered just how optimistic her estimate of a week to travel cross-country had been. After logging eight-and-a-half days on the road, they were still two days minimum out of Hamden, Connecticut, and as a result were driving hard. Their only stops were for supplies and water and fuel for the RV and to empty its waste water tanks. Laura had even opted to forego her runs in order to buy them some time.

What that meant for Remington personally was a reduction in the already scant hours he spent alone with her. And it was growing acute, his sense of deprivation was. No lovemaking for over a week, thanks to lack of privacy and opposite sleep schedules. None of the compensatory pleasures of extended kissing or, at the very least, conversation. It bore a striking resemblance to the long years of pursuit and courtship, when he'd lived in a perpetual state of unfulfilled desire for her. Only these days he was out of the old habit of iron self-control.

But there was, he reminded himself, an upside to a bit of personal distance between them. She'd already penetrated too deeply for his liking into his plans for going on the offense against Roselli as it was. While he wasn't averse to lying to her for her own good and to throw her off the scent, he preferred to reserve it as a last resort—or, better yet, avoid the direct question altogether. In that respect, Murphy was proving a useful buffer between them.

And a surprisingly trustworthy one. Remington was fully aware how near a thing it had been, Murphy coming over to his side as he had; he might very easily have remained Laura's man and spilled the beans about Remington's plans. Instead he was putting her welfare ahead of scoring points with her. That to Remington spoke volumes about the sincerity of his motives. And it did more than his half-hearted apology to compensate for the nasty remarks he'd made that first afternoon in Denver.

It had also persuaded him, Remington, to take an unprecedented leap of faith. "There's something else you should know," he'd told Murphy after they'd shaken hands on their deal to tackle Roselli in tandem. "This won't be the first time I've had him in my gun sights." And he'd amended the sanitized version Laura had spun for Murphy of the events in Pico Union, telling the truth in as clipped and objective language as possible, because he couldn't afford a second slip of his composure in one night. The other had been bad enough.

Murphy had listened intently, without interrupting. "What about Laura?" he asked when Remington had finished. "Where was she while this was going on?"

"At my side. Why?"

"I have a hard time picturing her condoning murder."

"She didn't, though not for the reasons you might think. But make no mistake about it. She wishes he was dead."

"I still don't get why she's insisting it's her fault."

Eyes on the road, Remington considered how he should answer. The fact of the matter was, untangle the convoluted threads of circumstances and trace them back to their source, and what you had was the phony marriage he'd cooked up to save himself from deportation. But he wasn't about to confess it to Murphy. That wasn't quite the abominably selfish concession to his ego that it appeared at first blush. Bring up Clarissa and the tuna-boat wedding, and Murphy, who despite his stuffiness was occasionally capable of a flash of investigative brilliance, might well deduce that Laura had been more than a passive target of Roselli's advances. Some husbands had no problem exposing their wives' past flings to all and sundry. Remington wasn't one of them.

Instead he said lightly: "Years of conditioning, I expect. You know what her mother's like." And crossed his fingers that Murphy would get the hint, and quit digging.

Over the next few nights, once they'd seen Laura safely off to bed, he and Murphy began to hammer out some tentative plans. Remington was of the opinion that the key to finding Roselli before Roselli found Laura lay with Elaine Casselis; their top priority would be obtaining the whereabouts of Roselli's East Coast bolt-hole from her by fair means or foul. With that in hand, the rest would be—well, not exactly child's play, but a good deal simpler to arrange.

Murphy wasn't so sure. "How do you know he even has a hideout?" he asked. "Seems to me he'd want to shorten the odds he could be traced."

"There's two ways to live a life outside the confines of the law. There's the nomad's way, bringing nothing with you, taking next to nothing away. Or there's the sedentary way."

"The sedentary way?"

"Operating from a permanent home base of sorts somewhere off the beaten path. Easy to retreat to when exposure threatens. Absolutely indispensable for shielding one's secrets from prying eyes."

"And you think Roselli's type number two."

"I know he is. Otherwise he'd never have hired that flat in Pico Union. He's a lot to hide, Roselli has, and carries the evidence with him when he possibly can. We'll find he's done something similar out here, mark my words."

Murphy still looked doubtful, but didn't reply. Nor did he return to the subject the next night, thanks to a new nit he'd found to pick. "I've been wondering, Steele. What's to stop Roselli from turning you in as soon as he gets word you're in Boston? And maybe Laura, too?"

"Good question. Nothing, I suppose."

"Well, what are we gonna do about it?"

Remington shrugged. "The floor's open for suggestions."

"Talk Laura out of playing decoy," Murphy said promptly.

"There's nothing I'd like better, but she'd never countenance it. You know it as well as I do."

"What if we beat him to the punch?"

"You mean go to the Boston police ourselves? Warn them he's likely on his way?"

"I'm thinking more along the lines of the FBI, since they're the ones who'd have jurisdiction. But yeah, that's basically the idea."

Several seconds went by in which the only sounds were the whoosh of the Fleetwood as it cleaved the air at sixty miles an hour and the rumble of its tires on the asphalt. "You're awfully quiet," Murphy remarked. "In my experience that's a bad sign."

"Merely debating the relative merits of your plan as opposed to mine."

"Don't bother. Mine's better."

"And you're basing that on-?"

"Less chance of you winding up in jail." As he spoke, Murphy was studying him; Remington could feel it. "You wanted to protect Laura," Murphy added. "This is your best bet."

Remington made a noise in his throat that was intended to communicate openness to the idea, if not actual assent. In the meantime he was glad he was driving. It meant Murphy couldn't see his eyes. Had Murphy done so, he'd have read the truth in a heartbeat.

Which was this: bringing the FBI into the picture and relying on them to deal with Roselli was a sorry alternative, in Remington's opinion. The situation had long passed the stage where obtaining justice could satisfy him. What he wanted—needed!—was to settle it _mano a mano_ with his nemesis.

Yes, and why was that? Uncharacteristically sleepless in his and Laura's bed seven hours later, he posed himself the question. He'd conquered the impulse towards physical violence months ago, had he not? The morning after he'd almost shot Roselli to death, and an October night not long afterward? Smashed a camera to smithereens, talked out his blood lust with Laura, and put away the seductive memories of slashing at the other man with his fists, his finger on the trigger of the Colt, a hairsbreadth away from blasting the devil back to the hell that had spawned him?

If he had, then it had returned with a vengeance. Perhaps he hadn't defeated it at all, but driven it underground, where it had waited for a pretext to surface. Well, by God, it had found it in the prospect of Laura courting danger on his behalf, and Roselli emerging menacingly from the shadows to prey on her again.

In other words, her fighting spirit had chosen the worst possible direction in which to rebound and re-assert itself.

Not a pretty thought, that. Shame welled up in him that he could've begrudged her return to herself in the smallest respect. It was what he'd prayed for, after all, every second of those first days when she'd drifted around the cabin at Twin Pines, a pallid, subdued little ghost. No, it wasn't her, it couldn't be, but everything Roselli had done to her already, and the danger into which she was heading now, that was feeding the fire inside him. And he knew of only one way to quench it. He needed to—he needed to—

What?

To _save_ her, damn it. To charge in, be the dragon slayer, no matter what the cost. To prove to the world that while she may have backed the dark horse in marrying him, the gamble was by no means as wrong-headed as it presently appeared—if he'd come a cropper in shielding her from Roselli's mayhem, and irretrievably mucked up the agency in his stupidity over Windsor Thomas, and his masquerade as Remington Steele had gone down in flames under the weight of his past, and he could no longer even provide his wife a home, he could yet offer his unflinching resolve to lay down his life for her sake, so he could…

The old sense of worthlessness was bidding fair to swamp him. To divert it, he reached out and touched Laura's side of the bed. He couldn't persuade himself that the sheets still radiated her warmth, but her fragrance definitely lingered in them; he scooped up her pillow and held it to his face. There it was, the very essence of her, putting him in mind as always of tiny white flowers exhaling their sweetness in some hidden, sun-drenched hollow. His dearest wife. His lovely love.

Who's the sentimental idiot, then? he asked himself, and smiled.

She was his to protect. That was what he'd sworn to Murphy. And unless Murphy could convince him beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Massachusetts branch of the FBI was more competent than its West Coast counterpart, he was sticking to his original scheme. There he could be certain of the instincts that directed the search, the steadiness of the hand on the hilt of the gun. For they would be his own.

So when Murphy sought him out in the galley that afternoon, Remington was ready with a number of plausible arguments. First amongst them was demolishing Murphy's assumption that Roselli was keen to involve law enforcement in his battle with the Steeles. "After all, Laura and I are the last eyewitnesses to his crimes, or near enough," he explained. "At this point it's in his best interest to see the twain never meet."

Murphy, he had to admit, seemed a trifle exasperated. "Think you could try speaking plain English for a change?"

"The last thing he wants is for us to tell our story to the FBI. Plain enough for you?"

"Yeah, and I'm not following your reasoning. He more or less gave you up to the LAPD, planting that gun in your safe."

"True. But he was operating with an advantage he no longer has. The element of surprise."

Murphy shook his head. Ignoring him, Remington continued: "He could've set the police up to finish his dirty work then, except his trap didn't work the way he meant it to, thanks to Laura's quick thinking. Now it's too late. He's just as much to fear from us in that regard as we have from him…perhaps more, since we have the gun."

"Steele, that's got to be the dumbest argument I ever heard."

Murphy was about to add something—the breath he'd just taken was the evidence—but just as she had the night of the rainstorm, Laura interrupted them.

"Guys?" she called from the driver's seat. "Front and center. We have a situation on our hands."

Never one to mince words in a potential crisis, she greeted Remington's and Murphy's arrival in the RV's cab with: "Looks like we've got company. The red Plymouth in the other lane."

Peering through one of the side windows, Remington checked it out. The car was a fairly new, sporty crimson Duster with a Hertz license plate affixed below its front bumper. Tinted windows effectively hid its driver from view.

Which made it all the creepier, the knowledge that whoever it was could see _them_.

"How long has he been with us?" Remington asked Laura.

"Since one o'clock. I guess we can take it for granted he's sticking to us like glue."

It was unconscious on Remington's part, the use of the singular masculine pronoun; probably it was on Laura's, too. But Murphy was glancing from one to the other of them with widened eyes. "My God. You don't think it's-"

"-Roselli?" Remington smiled grimly.

"The thought had occurred," added Laura.

"But how the hell did he figure out where we are?"

"It's that blasted internal radar of his. You'll get used to it, Murphy." Remington closed his hands on Laura's shoulders and squeezed. "About time for a round of the old bump-and-run routine, eh, my love?"

"Exactly what I was thinking. Make sure the coast is clear."

A lightning circuit of every window in the Fleetwood confirmed there were no highway patrolmen about. Traffic was light, and a grassy median separated the north- and southbound lanes of the interstate. Perfect for their purposes, Remington decided.

Returned to his station behind his wife, he reported the all-clear and motioned Murphy to take the passenger seat. He looked as if he could use a spot of bucking up, their comrade-in-arms did. Remington was happy to oblige. "Not to worry," he said. "Laura has experience in this sort of maneuver."

As if to underscore his words, the Fleetwood sprang forward with a roar. In a matter of moments the Duster was receding in its wake. "This thing has a hell of a lot more pick up than that old Winnebago," Laura announced with audible satisfaction.

"What Winnebago?" said Murphy.

"Long story, mate. Remind me to tell it later." Remington's gaze was fastened on the side mirror, which revealed the Duster rapidly making up lost ground. Laura goosed the accelerator again; the needle of the speedometer hit seventy-five and then ticked up to eighty. Once more the Duster dropped behind.

"A little cat-and-mouse to whet the appetite, Mrs. Steele?" Remington suggested.

He didn't have to see Laura's eyes to know they were dancing with mischief. "You know how I enjoy the milder forms of torture, Mr. Steele," she agreed. A split second, and she was back to all business. "Here he comes."

The Duster _was_ coming, and fast, preparing to pass them on the left. Laura gauged her moment. As soon as car's rear bumper had cleared the Fleetwood, she swung the steering wheel to the left, slicing neatly between the Duster and the sedan that was following it. "Gotcha!" she enthused.

There was no time to celebrate. Anyway, it was far from over. The Fleetwood was still rocking on its excellent shocks and struts when Laura put the pedal to the floor with delicate precision. In an abrupt but controlled burst of speed, the RV shot into the gap and met the Duster's rear bumper. _Thunk._

The Duster swerved slightly, corrected its course, jumped ahead. Laura was right there with it, applying more force. The second impact was louder and could be felt shuddering through the Fleetwood's floorboards.

"Wow," breathed Murphy.

"Remarkable, isn't she?" Remington replied. He meant it. In comparison his own most recent escapade—a deadly serious game of chicken with Norman Keyes on a Mexican airstrip about a year ago, his decrepit yellow bus versus Keyes' small plane—resembled a playground prank. And she seemed to be executing with admirable calm. Rock-solid, he'd have called her.

Still, it never hurt to check. "All right?" he asked her sotto voce.

"Yeah." The Duster was gathering speed again; she leaned forward, concentration evident in every line of her body. Instead of keeping pace, though, she was reining the RV in a little, allowing the gap between the two vehicles to lengthen. Obviously she had something up her sleeve, but Remington was damned if he could tell what it was.

In the next instant he had his answer. An overhead sign flashed by: they were within a mile of an approaching exit. Wrestling the wheel to the right, Laura cut over to the adjacent lane and floored it. In spite of its size, the Fleetwood lived up to its name and caught the car up with surprising ease. Metal scraped against metal as the driver side of the former connected with the passenger side of the latter.

Whoever was at the wheel of the Duster—Roselli?-must've had nerves of steel; though he veered onto the left shoulder for a few feet in an evasive tactic, he managed to hold his ground and regain the asphalt. Belligerently he leaned on his horn.

Laura remained unfazed. When he stepped on the gas, so did she, until she was neck and neck with him, and then outstripping him. Another turn of the wheel, and a leftward lunge of the RV. _Thud. _With shrieking tires the Duster went bouncing into the median, out of control.

"Damn!" Murphy exclaimed and leapt for the galley and the view from its windows. "He did a total one-eighty!" he called back to the Steeles. "It's a wipeout!"

Remington would've loved to have glimpsed that for himself, but Laura had steered towards the right and was guiding the Fleetwood up the exit ramp. Consequently he'd no idea where they were headed. Neither did she, he thought. Besides, he'd noticed the perspiration beading her hairline beneath her high ponytail, and the slackening of her arms until they were almost limp.

"Okay?" he asked, a repetition of his earlier question.

She pulled in a shaky breath, slowly let it out and then flashed him a wry smile through the mirror. "I could use a break. And a cup of coffee. And maybe a walk."

He bent to kiss her nape, tasting salt on her skin. "Anything for my intrepid bride."

Fifteen minutes later they and Murphy were debarking in the parking lot of Dodge's Diner. They'd stumbled upon it while deliberately venturing farther into small-town Pennsylvania than they might otherwise have gone via a series of intricate right and left turns intended to frustrate any would-be pursuers. To be honest, it looked to be the kind of quasi-greasy spoon Remington normally would've avoided like the proverbial plague. But lured by a sign promising the "best home cooking this side of the Alleghenies"—and propelled by Laura's obvious fatigue-he'd put up no objection to stopping.

A chalkboard suspended above the horseshoe-shaped counter directed them to seat themselves. They did, at a secluded corner table in the back, where they could simultaneously keep an eye on the Fleetwood and the door. The diner's other customers, perhaps twenty-five in all, paid them no heed as they threaded their way towards it single file.

A cheerful young waitress in jeans and a green Dodge's t-shirt took their order. Once she'd served coffee and water all around, it was only natural that the mood would segue into a belated victory celebration. "I've seen you do some fancy driving in my day, old partner," Murphy declared. "But I think you just outdid yourself. That was awesome!"

The coffee had revived some of Laura's sparkle. "It helps to be the one behind the wheel of a twelve-ton motor home. Thank your lucky stars it wasn't an old Winnebago on its last legs."

"Yeah, what about that Winnebago, Steele?"

"Let's just say this wasn't the first time Laura's deterred a couple of lowlifes by means of a well-played game of chicken," said Remington.

"Only then it was the Arizona high desert," Laura said. "On a two-lane road."

"With sheer drops a looming hazard," Remington supplied.

"And hairpin turns."

"And two bratty kiddies continually throwing a spanner in the works." Remington intercepted the admonishment in Laura's glance. "It's all well and good to glare at me," he protested. "But how else would you have me describe them?"

"Chris and Angel weren't brats, not really. They were…misunderstood. Crying out for attention."

"Who were they?" Murphy wanted to know.

"The spawn-" Remington began; Laura elbowed him in the side. "—That is, the offspring of notorious corporate and political whistleblower, Walter Gallen. Heard of him?"

"Who hasn't?"

"Gallen was tapped to testify before the grand jury," Laura said. "He hired us to deliver his children to him in Phoenix, under the radar. Unfortunately, his enemies had other ideas for them."

"Using the children as bargaining chips, or pawns, if you prefer. And they came after us with guns ablaze. But in the end, Remington Steele Investigations lived up to its reputation, and saved the day." Remington cocked an eyebrow at Murphy. "See what you've been missing all these years in the wilds of Denver?"

"I guess I have." There really _was_ a hint of wistfulness in Murphy's sigh, Remington noted.

The arrival of their dinner interrupted them; soon they were applying themselves to the ballyhooed "home cooking". Fortunately the Dodge's owner hadn't exaggerated his chef's talents in conceiving his business's catchphrase. Considering what they'd just gone through, it wasn't to be wondered that the food, which was more than passable, absorbed the attention of the Roselli hunters for while.

At length Laura excused herself and headed for the restrooms on the opposite side of the horseshoe. As soon as she was out of earshot, Remington gazed across at his other dining companion. "Convinced yet?"

Murphy swiped his mouth with his napkin. "About what?"

"That Roselli's on a one-man quest to overtake us, sans law enforcement. If you aren't, you should be."

"_Oh_, yeah." Murphy's affirmative was fervent and immediate. "I learned something else today, too."

"What's that?"

"You weren't exaggerating when you said it's uncanny, the way he seems to always be where you're least expecting him. I mean, I thought it was just you, and your bullshit, or blarney, or whatever you call it-"

"Suggesting my veracity can't be depended on, are we?"

"Let's face it, Steele, you do have a tendency to…embellish…a little."

"Embellish? You cut me to the quick."

"Ha, ha-" There Murphy clammed up with a nod in the direction of the restrooms. Automatically Remington rose, anticipating Laura's return. As soon as he'd handed her into her chair, he knew—how, he wasn't certain, for it wasn't visible in her face—that something was dreadfully wrong.

She motioned him and Murphy to lean in towards her. Even so her eyes were restless, sweeping the dining room above their heads. Her expression never changed as she said, rapidly and in a low tone: "Don't look up, don't react and for God's sake keep your voices down. The Duster's here."

"Here? Where?" Remington couldn't suppress the sharp whisper.

"In back. I saw it from the ladies' room. I don't know how he did it…but Roselli's found us again."

TO BE CONTINUED


	11. PART I: Chapter 11

Chapter 11

"_Duel_," said Remington.

It slipped out without conscious intent on his part, the movie annotation did. Honestly he didn't realize he'd said it aloud until two pairs of brown eyes turned in his direction. No doubt mistaking it for pithy commentary on their situation, Laura regarded him thoughtfully. "I suppose we did throw down the gauntlet with that game of bump-and-run," she said. "And this is his way of saying he accepts the challenge."

Remington shook his head. "It's a film by Steven Spielberg. His first, actually. Dennis Weaver co-starring with a gigantic lorry, Universal, 1971."

"You gotta be kidding me," said Murphy, rolling his eyes at Laura.

"What's wrong, Murph?"

"Please tell me he doesn't still go around trying to relate stuff he sees in the movies to real-life cases."

"Discussing relevant movie scenarios often leads Mr. Steele to…useful…insights." It was Laura's canned response, never offered with strong conviction. This time was no exception. She demanded of Remington: "You _do_ have an insight you're going to share with us, right?"

"Weaver plays a businessman who offends the lorry's unseen driver by passing him on the highway, and is forced to flee for his life when it becomes plain the driver means to take revenge. Tries to run him off the road…almost forces a smash-up with another car…"

"I don't get the connection, Steele," said Murphy. "We're the ones who messed with Roselli, not the other way around."

"Except that Weaver lands in similar circumstances, taking refuge in a diner, only to return from the gents to discover the lorry in the parking lot. Of course, we have an advantage he didn't. We know what our nemesis looks like."

"Good point. So…you guys see him anywhere?"

Cautiously the Steeles scanned the dining room in as systematic yet unobtrusive a fashion as they could. The process of elimination left five possible candidates, men whose height and build were roughly congruent with that of their pursuer. Of the five, two were too old, as manifest by genuine bald heads and wrinkles; the fourth was accompanied by a sextet of badly behaved youngsters and a harried woman who couldn't be anyone but their mother; the fourth—late thirties, wire-rimmed spectacles, nose in a book—had golden brown hair and hazel eyes.

Ah, but the fifth man was a different story. Seated at a two-top on the opposite side of the diner and closer to the door, a nylon windbreaker concealing his clothing, he was visible only in profile, but the right physical type, Remington thought. That thick head of gray hair could easily be a wig, just as the mustache and beard were probably false. And weren't the big, muscular hands identical to Roselli's?

Apparently Laura had drawn the same conclusion, for she nudged him under the table. Though Murphy, who was watching them both, was too much of a pro to react overtly, it was clear he accepted their judgment. By unspoken consensus, they had their man.

A shame it wasn't the time or place to confront him openly. Remington would've argued for it—even insisted on it-but the look in Laura's eyes persuaded him to hold his tongue. She was frightened. Possibly she wasn't aware of it herself. And she wasn't ready. Perhaps the sight of Roselli, no longer the shadow stalking them from a remove, but here in the dangerous flesh, was bringing her to her senses. Remington could only pray God it would lead her to re-think the idea of acting as a decoy, as well.

Meanwhile, her voice pitched just above a whisper, she was saying: "That window in the ladies room? It's big enough for you guys to crawl through. And the door locks from inside."

"Excellent observation, Mrs. Steele. Might I suggest a diversion to cover our departure?"

"What did you have in mind?"

"Something innocuous…something that won't arouse his suspicions." Remington glanced around, brain working away, until inspiration struck. With a conspiratorial nod to his companions he rose and sauntered hands in pockets towards the counter.

The effervescent little waitress who'd served them was there, transferring clean glasses from a plastic flat to a shelf. Remington paused in front of the pie case and beamed a wide smile at her. "Kristi, is it? I think we're about ready for dessert. What would you recommend?"

He made unhurried small talk with her as she went through the sweets menu with him. By and by, and in the same light, conversational tone, he asked, "Is the owner here today, by any chance?"

"Um, in the kitchen. Did you want me to get him for you-?"

Remington signaled a negative. "Is there a back door out of the kitchen?"

"Uh-huh."

"Then I wonder if you'd do me a favor. Ask the owner if I might pay our bill to him direct and exit through the rear? There's an extra fifty in it for him if he agrees—and a twenty for you for your trouble. Oh, and I'll take a slice of chocolate cream pie for my wife, banana cream for my friend and cherry for me. You can bring your answer to our table along with the pie."

Back at Laura's side, he outlined the arrangements he'd made and was rewarded by her approving smile. "I'll duck out first," she said. "Give it ten minutes, Murph, and then follow me. The door'll be locked, so you'll have to knock. Mr. Steele? You know what to do. Meet us at the Fleetwood in twenty. And if _he_ gives you any trouble-"

"-Run?"

"Like hell. The engine'll be running."

The air was charged with tension as, step by step, they executed the plan. After a few bites of pie, Laura stole away; soon Murphy joined her. Roselli, if it was really him, didn't seem to notice their departure, for he neither turned around nor looked up.

That left Remington, vigilant beneath a veneer of surface unconcern, enmeshed in an internal struggle. It was all he could do to remain seated casually in his chair. If not for the onlookers, he'd have crossed the room in two strides, hauled his enemy up by the collar and dragged him outside, there to finish him off forever. The desire to encircle Roselli's throat was so consuming, Remington's hands flexed involuntarily; it maddened him to think of the Colt in the Fleetwood, so near, yet thoroughly inaccessible, like forbidden fruit. It was typical of his damnable luck, too. To come virtually face-to-face with the bastard _here_, of all places-! The more he thought about it, the more he questioned whether Providence really was as firmly on his side in this situation as he'd believed.

Icy calm, he told himself—his and Laura's habitual mantra for quelling strong emotion. Icy calm. One way or the other, you'll get your chance.

Kristi was approaching with the bill. Tearing his attention reluctantly from Roselli, Remington trailed her around the horseshoe to the kitchen, where the owner was waiting to collect his money. Remington forked it over with gratitude. "You've done us an immeasurable service," he said. "Keep the change, won't you?" A wink as he slipped the twenty to Kristi, and he was easing through the exit, wary eye peeled for signs of pursuit.

There were none. Murphy had angled the Fleetwood so that its nose was pointed towards the driveway; Remington had only to spring aboard, and they were away. "He see you?" Murphy asked.

"Not that I'm aware of."

"Hope he likes Pennsylvania. Something tells me his stay here is gonna be longer than he bargained for."

Murphy exchanged a glance with Laura. Alive to the gleam of triumph in it, Remington demanded, "What've I missed?"

Murphy's grin broadened. "Show him, partner."

The oil-stained object Laura held out was unfamiliar to Remington. "Distributor cap," she explained. "He'll find it hard traveling without it. Or these." On her left palm lay the tiny caps that should've by rights crowned the valve stems of each of the Duster's four tires. "We took the liberty of letting the air out, too. It's not much, but at least we've bought ourselves some time."

He had to congratulate them, of course he did, on their cleverness and ingenuity and quick thinking. But his heart wasn't really in it. In fact it was counter to his private musings, which went something like this:

Had they bought more time?

Or were they delaying the attainment of his cherished goal?

At that moment, and with a twinge of carefully hidden exasperation, he had to confess he was inclined to consider it the latter.

* * *

Hamden, Connecticut, home of Quinnipiac University, was something unique in Remington's experience of the States: a town that reminded him a little of England. It was the cool, overcast weather, the narrow streets, tidy stone or clapboard houses, front gardens, the tall oaks and maples haloed by pale green buds and the white church with its neat steeple that awakened the impression in him. Otherwise Hamden's supermarkets and convenience stores and fast food restaurants marked it as distinctly American.

It was a quarter past six when they arrived, too late to transact the business they'd hoped to. They had to postpone it to the following day, hiring a car, scouting out a safe spot in which to secrete the RV and then setting out for Elaine Casselas' flat. Tonight, a little weary of the close quarters to which they'd been subject for the last ten days, the Steeles and Murphy checked into a hotel.

By prior arrangement they re-grouped at half past seven at a steak house across the street, where Murphy reported good news from Los Angeles. The team of Brewer and Walsh had decided at the outset that searching for physical evidence that put Roselli at the scene of Windsor's murder was a waste of time. Instead they'd worked an angle the police hadn't thought of. Already they'd gained access to and swept the phone lines that served 1046 Century Plaza and Remington Steele Investigations' offices, uncovering the listening devices Roselli had installed. Next they were planning an incursion of the Licensing Bureau. If there was proof of the means by which Roselli had finagled a legitimate private investigator's license in Remington Steele's name, Nick and Jeff were confident they would uncover it.

"What about Mildred?" Laura interrupted, sounding a trifle anxious to Remington's ears. "She's been working with them, hasn't she?"

"Helping them get a line on where Roselli's been holed up, from what I understand. I told Mason to tell 'em not to bother, he's already flown the coop. But wait'll you hear the rest. Mason's contacts came through with background on Roselli's army service."

Murphy drew a sheet of notepaper from his shirt pocket. "Apparently his squad was some kind of demolitions team, bomb experts, assigned to the East German border," he said. "They were good at it—racked up a lot of missions in the 'win' column. Roselli didn't attract much attention either way, decent soldier, did his job, until he was caught in the ambush that killed him."

The Steeles exchanged a glance that was compounded mostly of disappointment. The information added little to what they already knew; Murphy's excitement seemed misplaced. "That's it?" Remington asked, speaking for both of them

"Here's the best part-the names of the guys on that final raid." Murphy fed them the list, which amounted to nineteen names. He finished with: "…and Lieutenant David Flannery."

There was a pause. "_Flannery_?" the Steeles exclaimed in unison.

"Yep. What do you make of that?"

"The guy who showed up on the agency's doorstep the day after the press conference? And knew enough about Mr. Steele and me to contact you?" Laura said. "He's trouble. What else did Mason find out about him? Did he say?"

"Nothing so far, but I asked him to keep digging."

"That's good, because I'm fresh out of theories just now." With a sigh Laura pushed away her half-eaten dinner. "I'm ready to go when you are, guys."

It was a rather silent trio that wended its way back to the hotel and boarded the elevator together. Murphy in particular had an unusually gloomy air about him. Missing his family, was Remington's guess. He'd suffered the pangs of separation from Laura often enough over the course of their marriage to recognize the signs. And he didn't forget for a second the reason Murphy was making the sacrifice in the first place.

So he surrendered to impulse as the elevator doors opened on the fourth floor and, before Murphy could step out, grasped his hand in a parting clasp. "Sleep well, old chap. And thanks…for everything."

Murphy did a double take. "You, too. 'Night, Laura."

The elevator resumed its ascent. Laura was assessing him with a quizzical gaze, Remington found. "What was that about?" she asked.

He kept his eyes on the illuminated display panel, counting off the floors. Five…six… "Oh, nothing. He just struck me as lonesome, Murphy did. Hardly surprising, with Sherry and the boys so far away."

The elevator door chimed: seventh floor. As it slid open, Laura said softly, "You never cease to amaze me, Mr. Steele."

He smiled down at her. "A state of mind I'm intimately acquainted with, Mrs. Steele." And he conducted her into the hallway with a hand at the small of her back.

Prompted by the lingering sense of claustrophobia engendered by extended travel in an RV, they'd popped for a two-room suite this go-round. In the bedroom they puttered about for a few minutes, unpacking toiletries and nightclothes, turning down the bed. When Laura closeted herself in the bathroom, Remington wandered out to the living room and plopped down on the sofa to search the television channels. Nothing appealed to him. Or perhaps the problem was he couldn't—didn't want to-shut off his thoughts.

He shut off the television instead.

They were sobering, those thoughts of his. The better to allow them free rein, he moved to the sliding glass door that led to what he might've called a balcony, except it was little more than a three-by-eight-foot slab of concrete. Cracking the window admitted a head-clearing spring breeze.

How would Roselli's sudden arrival on the scene alter Laura's plan? Would it affect it at all? That was what Remington wanted to know. Up to now she'd said nothing about the Boston Marathon. Should he assume she still intended to run it? If so, did she mean to use Elaine Casselas as an unwitting messenger? In Remington's opinion the idea had dubious merit at best back when there was a continent between them and Roselli. Was it in any measure feasible now that he was a day's journey away, or less?

More to the point: would Remington and Murphy have enough time to launch their counter-offensive, given Roselli's proximity? Or was Remington to dismiss it as so much wasted emotion and energy, and consign it to the mental dustbin, so to speak? And afterwards resign himself to acting as Laura's bodyguard and shadow on race day, a passive role that he chafed at adopting, considering the amount of control it gave Roselli over the outcome?

It was a frustrating dilemma no matter how he sliced it. Fraught with marital pitfalls, too. If only he were a skilled enough diplomat to talk her out of the folly she was contemplating without sparking a revolt! But if he knew Laura, her earlier fear notwithstanding, Roselli's appearance had served to harden her resolve to bait him rather than soften it. Backing out so late in the game would make her look weak and cowardly, that was how she would see it. And there was nothing Laura hated more than being thought a coward.

He'd no inkling that she was standing in the doorway watching him until she said: "Mr. Steele?"

He turned. The surprise that awaited him triggered what he was certain was a huge, goofy grin. Tonight she'd traded the practicalities of pajamas for romance, specifically a pretty negligee that managed to be simultaneously elegant and provocative. Freed from the ponytail, her hair fell about her shoulders in shining waves; she was fresh from her shower, scented with the fragrance that never failed to intoxicate him, and her lips were curved in a delicious smile.

All for him!

For a moment or two she stayed where she was in that way she had, giving him a chance to look her over. Look he did, and continued to do as she approached him. It was, after all, the sight he'd hankered after incessantly over their first five years together, a seductively clad Laura seeking him out on her own terms, desire in her eyes. Eleven months of marriage, and the sense of newness, along with a trace of disbelief at his incredible good fortune, had yet to wear off. Possibly he'd be savoring it well into his nineties.

Onward she came, right into his arms, pressing close. She unfastened one shirt button, then another, and slid her hand beneath the fabric. Warm fingertips threaded through the hair on his chest, caressing him. He shivered and sighed at her touch and she smiled up at him, a woman who knew how to please her lover, and delighted in using the power she possessed to make him hers.

"At the risk of sounding disloyal to Murphy," she said, "alone at last?"

"Very true, as clichés go. No disrespect to Murphy intended."

He bent his head; their lips hovered, met, lingered. They moved apart for a few seconds and then melted together again, clinging even more feverishly. It was an instance of pure serendipity that just as she was stretching up to encircle his neck, he was leaning down to scoop her into his arms.

The murmur of pleasure she gave as she rested her head on his shoulder was a tremendous boost to his ego, not to mention an important region of his anatomy. "I can recall a time when you absolutely detested it, me holding you like this," he remarked. He maneuvered so she could slide the patio door shut and draw the drapes. "And not so long ago, either."

"What can I say? You've worn down my resistance. I'm even starting to like it when you call me 'baby'."

"Are you?" He'd carried her over to the table lamp he'd lit; she switched it off.

"Which is funny, because if any other man ever had the nerve, I'd clobber him."

"Excuse me? If another man should presume to address my wife as 'baby', _I'll_ clobber him."

"We'll take turns."

He kicked the bedroom door shut behind them and bore her to the bed. There the sexy, playful mood not only held, but intensified red-hot through the shedding of their clothes, their frolicking over the breadth of the mattress in exuberant love play. But then, that was the definition of their relationship, he thought. In his entire vast experience with women, had he ever talked so much during sex as he did with Laura? Laughed so much? Of course he hadn't. Because with her it wasn't just flesh he was after, never had been, not from the very first moment. Shared experiences and future hopes, affection and need, personalities and intellects, minds and bodies: those were what their connection was forged of, and made it the enduring thing it was.

And hearts, it went without saying. Especially those.

"I've missed this," he gasped at the finale of a breath-stopping kiss, reaching for her breasts.

"So have I." Naked, disheveled, so beautiful that he ached from it, she gazed down at him, dark eyes aglow. "Oh, Mr. Steele…so have I."

But much later, long after she'd curled against him and fallen asleep, he lay staring up at the ceiling, frankly unsettled. In his head he was covering the same ground he had earlier, the situation with Roselli and his own reaction to it. Only now he was seeing it from a perspective he hadn't before.

Was his campaign to eliminate Roselli behind her back…well…misguided? In his zeal to protect her, had he gone a trifle overboard?

It was making love to her-unleashing the little firecracker that dwelt beneath her focused, rational exterior-that was making him think twice. Coupled with her bang-up performance at running Roselli off the road, it was a timely reminder of precisely who she was. Bold. Independent. Unlikely to take kindly to be being shielded like a delicate flower, as she'd informed him and Murphy recently. And that was putting it mildly.

"No one's going take to away my right to revenge," she'd said in September, on the night he'd threatened to lock her in the house if that was what it would take to stop her from hunting down Roselli in Pico Union. "Not even you, Remington." A statement that had lost none of its validity over the ensuing months. He could count on it.

Yes, but it wasn't as if he meant to demean her, or question her abilities. All he wanted in the deep recesses of his masculine soul was to cherish his wife. Was that too much to ask?

Better not let her hear you talk like that, he advised himself. Or find out what's up your sleeve. Because in addition to a bold, independent, intrepid firecracker of a woman, there was something else Laura was: a perfect Fury when enraged.

And just now he wasn't confident he could stand the prospect of that rage descending on his well-intentioned, but potentially traitorous, head.

* * *

The answers to three of the questions plaguing Remington were these.

Laura was as determined as ever to lure Roselli into the open at the Boston Marthon. If anything, the fact that _he'd_ been tracking _them_ had so nettled her, she was itching to get started, exactly as Remington had suspected.

And yes, Elaine Casselas continued to be Laura's go-between of choice.

That was why five in the afternoon of the following day found the Steeles and Murphy staking out Casselas' building. They'd ascertained that she wasn't home hours ago by the simple expedient of ringing her doorbell. Now it was a matter of waiting in their hired gray Ford for her to return to her flat, one of twelve in a three-story walk-up located a few blocks from the Quinnipiac campus.

Thus far all the traffic into the walk-up had been the wrong age, wrong sex, or both. But at last a slender blonde weighed down by a book bag turned the corner and walked up the street. The Roselli hunters exchanged a glance; though they were expecting a student, thanks to Mildred's research, none of them had realized Elaine Casselas was so young.

"Give her five minutes and then let's move," Laura said in an undertone as Casselas climbed the front steps and put her key into the lock. In Laura's coat pocket resided the letter Casselas had written Roselli, along with the drivers license identifying her as Laura Steele, Remington knew. His Laura was nothing if not prepared.

And thoroughly composed about the business of gaining admittance to Casselas' flat. "Ms. Casselas?" she said into the intercom. "My name is Laura Steele. I'm here about a letter you sent my husband."

Even through the static, they could hear that the answering voice was soft and hesitant. "I'm sorry—what did you say your name was?"

"Laura Steele. I have the letter with me, if you'd like to see it."

There was no reply for a beat or two. Then: "Come up."

Turning to Remington and Murphy, who were on the step below, Laura nodded her satisfaction. "We're on."

Together they mounted the stairs and headed for apartment 3D. There was no need to knock at Casselas' door; it was wide open, framing her in the postage-stamp sized entry. On closer inspection she looked younger even than she had on the street, Remington observed, very attractive to be sure, but with an unfinished quality about her. It was difficult to credit that a man of violence and blood like Roselli would've fallen for her.

Her eyes traveled from Remington's face to Murphy's before lighting on Laura's. "Mrs. Steele-?"

Taking advantage of the girl's uncertainty, Laura held out the letter. "Here. Do you recognize it?"

Speechless, Casselas nodded.

"It's come as a surprise, to say the least. We're hoping you can help us get to the bottom of it."

"I didn't think…he never told me-" Casselas gulped, shook her head and made a second attempt to the get the words out. "I can't believe he's _married_."

"Oh, he is, trust me. Don't worry, we'll explain everything. But first there's someone I'd like you to meet."

That was Remington's cue to deliver the line he'd conceived and rehearsed. He stepped forward and held out his hand.

"Hello, Miss Casselas," he said with a smile he hoped was dazzling. "I'm her husband, Remington Steele."

TO BE CONTINUED


	12. PART I: Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Remington's announcement might have knocked Elaine Casselas further off balance. That was the reaction the Roselli hunters had anticipated, anyway. Instead, eyes narrowed and mouth thinned in suspicion, she began to back up towards the living room. From under her feet came the crackle of paper—her mail, dropped while talking to Laura over the intercom. "What is this, some kind of joke?" she said.

Without missing a beat, Remington followed her before she could slam the door in their collective faces. "The very question we posed ourselves upon the delivery of your rather…ah…amorous letter. Eh, Mrs. Steele?"

"We did, Mr. Steele." Laura had slipped smoothly into the flat on Remington's heels and was flanking him. "Except it didn't take long to conclude we were dealing with a case of mistaken identity. It was a piece of cake to confirm my husband wasn't anywhere near here the night of your little…adventure. Besides, he isn't that kind of man."

"And so the question became, who could've been impersonating me? And what did he hope to gain from it? Shall we share what we've learned, Miss Casselas?" asked Remington.

"Why should I listen to you? How do I even know you are who you say you are?"

"An omission easily corrected." Remington gave place to Laura, who had the requisite credentials near at hand: his drivers license, several _LA Times _articles judiciously chosen for their early dates and their prominent photos of Remington, and a snap of him and Laura in front of the agency door, circa 1982. Casselas took them without a word. The longer she looked them over, the more her defiant expression crumpled, transforming her into the very picture of bewildered innocence.

"He lied to me," she whispered.

The Steeles met each other's eyes. Until that point Casselas had been an unknown quantity, equally likely to be a blameless dupe or an active accomplice in Roselli's schemes. Her reaction now suggested the former. Then again, it was possible she was a consummate actress. It would take further probing to help them make up their minds.

Laura said: "Are you telling us you weren't aware that the man you wrote to has been masquerading as Remington Steele for the past seven months?"

"Oh, no! How could I? I met him at one of his lectures!"

"Where was that?" put in Murphy, who'd heretofore kept to the background, letting the Steeles take the lead.

"Wilton, last October. One of my profs recommended it. He knew his work—Remington's—I mean…" The girl trailed off miserably; tears welled in her eyes. "I'm not sure what to call him."

"We'll get to that in a minute." Taking Casselas' arm, Laura steered her to a seat on the sofa in a grip that was firm but gentle. "So you attended his lecture, and-?"

"He was really, really good. Especially the part about the three types of criminal mind. I admired him so much—I just had to meet him in person."

Here Remington and Laura shared another glance, this one of mutual disgust. Remington had had his own experiences with fans over the years, women who were attracted by the so-called Remington Steele mystique and approached him with varying degrees of subtlety after an event in which he'd played a starring role. Despite the strong sexual temptation, he'd always maintained a certain level of decorum for the sake of the agency, as well as his relationship with Laura. Never would it have occurred to him to become entangled with a girl barely in her twenties. Her age did go a long way towards explaining the baroque excess of that misdirected love letter, however.

"He's a little…old…for you, isn't he?' he asked Casselas, trying to be as inoffensive as he could.

It was the wrong thing to say. Immediately her defiance flared again. "I love him and he loves me!"

"Does he? He's rather an odd way of showing it, then, lying to you for months."

From her seat next to Casselas Laura was shaking her head at him in warning: knock it off. "This really isn't helping, Mr. Steele," she added, and turned her attention back to Casselas. "And it's not our reason for being here. What I'm interested in is the content of the lecture. 'The three types of criminal mind'. Can you tell us a little about that?"

"They were the three bad guys he had the toughest time outsmarting. Major Descoines, Norman Keyes and Tony Roselli. Wait, I'll get the notes."

Remington watched, barely able to curb his impatience, as page by page Laura reviewed the notes Casselas had handed her and passed them to him. Her careful neutrality didn't waver, not for a second; once he began to read the first page, he realized what a triumph of will that was. For these weren't Casselas' jottings, but a transcript of the remarks Roselli had actually given. And as far as Remington could glean, Roselli's presentation of Remington Steele Investigations' dealings with Descoines and Keyes was dead accurate. Disturbingly so.

The same thought was in Murphy's mind, at least in terms of Descoines. "Roselli sure did his homework, didn't he?" he commented in an undertone to Remington. "That's exactly how the Lily Martin case played out."

"Makes me all the more anxious to learn what he said about himself."

But on that score Remington was disappointed; instead of finishing the transcript, Laura glanced up at Casselas. "Is there some way I could make a copy of this?"

"Keep it. I have extras. Mrs. Steele…?"

"Yes?"

"You say he's not Remington Steele. Then who is he? Why won't you tell me?"

It seemed to Remington that Laura's answer was a long time coming. It wasn't like her to prolong the suspense, not with a teary Casselas standing there wringing her hands. The girl was clearly clinging to a last shred of hope that it was all a mix-up, and her lover would somehow turn out to be an upstanding chap. Remington would've taken it upon himself to enlighten her, except he was wary of getting at cross-purposes with Laura.

Finally Laura rose to her feet; she'd come to a decision. From the look in her eyes Remington wagered she wasn't very happy about it.

"He's a man who goes by many names, Ms. Casselas," she said. "But we know him best as Tony Roselli."

* * *

"There goes any chance we had of nailing him at the Marathon," Laura said glumly.

Glum had been her default mood since they'd left Elaine Casselas' flat. Before they did, Laura had finished breaking the rest of the bad news to her. Not only was Casselas' lover the very man he'd depicted in his own speech as a criminal mastermind, he had the blood of two innocent women on his hands.

Naturally the girl was distraught, and Laura had done her best to comfort her. Finally she'd slid one of her old business cards into Casselas' hand. "In case you need to reach us," she said. "The number of the hotel we'll be staying at in Boston is on the back. We'll be there through the Marathon. Call us if you need anything, okay?"

Once the Steeles and Murphy had returned to the Ford, Laura allowed her discouragement to show. The way she slumped in the passenger seat was the biggest clue. Remington for his part couldn't quite understand the problem, and told her so. "You handed her the information you want her to feed Roselli, didn't you? Literally. How can you call it a failure?"

"You saw her, Mr. Steele. She's terrified of him now. Too terrified to ever take the initiative in contacting him again." Laura grimaced. "All this way for nothing."

"You did the right thing," said Murphy from the back seat. "The poor kid had no idea what the hell she's gotten into herself into. She needed to hear the truth."

"I know. Here I've been picturing this hard-boiled woman of the world, and instead she's a naïve little co-ed. I never would've forgiven myself if I hadn't told her." She turned her gaze on Remington; even from the periphery of his vision he could see it sparkled with challenge. "Well?" she demanded.

"Well what?"

"Aren't you going to weigh in? And don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about."

He hesitated. He'd deliberately squelched every sign of relief at the suggestion she was backing off the Marathon, both because she'd hardly appreciate it and because it would be a damning indicator of how deeply the prospect was bothering him. Better to deflect her, was what he decided.

"Reading me like a book again, eh?" he replied.

"You haven't exactly been shy about expressing yourself on the subject. Admit it. You're thrilled."

"Do I look thrilled to you?"

Indeed, the long face he pulled was meant to convey solidarity with her disappointment. Unimpressed, she swatted his bicep with the back of her hand. "You don't seriously expect me to believe you're sorry I won't be running, do you?"

"No, but you'd set your heart on it. That means something to me, whatever you may think."

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" said Murphy, a propos of nothing. "Laura, where was Roselli based while he was actually taking cases? Boston, right?"

"That's what it looks like. Why?"

"According to this phone bill, Elaine Casselas placed a total of seventeen long distance calls last month to a number with a Boston area code."

Remington peered at Murphy through the rearview mirror while Laura slewed around in her seat. "How did you-?" she asked.

"I kind of helped myself." Murphy was grinning broadly.

On reflection Remington could pinpoint the precise moment when Murphy must've purloined the bill: he'd presented Casselas with a handful of envelopes, the ones she'd scattered in the entry way, before following the Steeles out the door. "Very devious of you," Remington commended him. "We'll make a proper clandestine operator out of you yet."

"Thanks, but I think my clients appreciate me just the way I am. C'mon, Steele, step on it. The sooner we get back to the hotel so I can call Sam DeLisle with the info, the better."

Murphy's insistence on haste was justified. Within the hour The Michaels Group's researcher had matched the Boston phone number with a business address. She'd come up with the name of the business, too.

Remington Steele Investigations.

Considering how she'd exploded upon learning that the shadow Steele was fouling their reputation by taking sordid cases, Remington thought Laura reacted fairly calmly to this fresh misappropriation of their name. Certainly her eyes flashed fire and an ominous frown clouded her brow. But all she said was: "I guess we're going to Boston after all."

Twilight of the next day found them sizing up an aging office building in the low-rent district near Logan International—searching, as Murphy would've put it, for the soft spots in its defenses. There was no security guard, a factor in their favor. So was the distance from the city center, which meant the parking lot was virtually empty at this hour. Parked in the rear near the shipping entrance, the Steeles' gray Ford went unnoticed by the final stragglers exiting the offices and heading towards their cars.

"Not much for appearances, is he?" Remington said, a reference to Roselli, eyeing the seedy surroundings with distaste.

"Except maybe his own," Laura replied, and inclined her head towards two pairs of heavy steel doors that opened onto the loading dock. "Is that our ticket inside?"

"Either that or the roof. Murphy?"

"Looks good to me."

Rapidly they crossed the distance between the Ford and the rear of the building, three black-clad figures skimming through darker pools of shadow. With the hydraulic lifts shut down for the day, the dock's elevation was a little too high for Laura to negotiate unassisted; Remington scaled it first and reached down a hand for her. Then it was Murphy's turn. The speed with which he swung up next to them proved that despite having spent the last four years in the corner office, he was as fit and athletic as ever.

"Glad to see you're more than a mere figurehead," Remington quipped, and couldn't help smirking at his comrade's indignant expression as he beckoned Laura to bring her flashlight and turned to the matter at hand.

Which was determining what sort of alarm he was dealing with, if any, and how to disarm it. Lucky for them it was an ancient affair, easily silenced by manipulating a couple of wires. The locks were just as simple to dispense with. A few deft twists of the pick, and he and Laura and Murphy were inside.

The more prudent course of action was to ascend to the fourth floor, where the fraudulent Steele agency was located, by means of the stairs rather than the elevator. Soft though the footfalls of the Roselli hunters were, the sounds echoed eerily in the empty stairwell. It was a relief to reach the fourth floor landing, where Remington opened the door a crack to make sure the coast was clear. Utter stillness reigned, as far as he could tell. Even so his hand hovered in an unconscious, protective gesture at the small of Laura's back as he ushered her out ahead of him.

He found it a bit disconcerting, seeing the name of their agency painted in bold letters and placarded onto the otherwise generic oak door that led to suite 402. Beside him Laura drew her breath in sharply; the frown was back, deeper than ever. But her voice remained under control. "At least we can be thankful for one thing. No Reverend Randy Rawlinson or Brother Curt lying in wait for us."

"Nor any of the murderous Underwood family. Shawn…Vickie…" Remington had dropped to a crouch and was working the lock as he spoke. "Though I have to admit, I'd much rather Mulch was the mastermind behind these shenanigans."

Murphy was glancing from Remington to Laura. "Do I even want to know?"

Laura patted his arm. "A long and very convoluted story. We'll break out that bottle of Maker's some night."

The door swung inward. The beam from Laura's flashlight arced along the walls, confirming what they already suspected, that there was no one inside. As workspaces went it was modest, a small reception area with a single office, lav and an adjoining storage-slash-cloakroom tacked on behind it. Enough to sustain the illusion of a legitimate business without breaking the bank in the process, Remington thought, and reluctantly afforded Roselli a mental tip of the hat.

Immediately the overheads flickered on, Laura was attacking the file cabinets in the inner office with concentrated zeal. Eager to stay out of the line of fire, Remington refrained from offering a hand. Anyway he'd a covert objective of his own to accomplish: the discovery of a signpost that would point him in the direction of the local hidey-hole he was convinced Roselli had set up for himself. Difficult to pull off with Laura only a few feet away, but not impossible. Remington had the utmost confidence in his talent for subterfuge. And he had Murphy on his side.

He was in the midst of rifling the desk drawers with his trademark feather-light touch when Laura said: "Remington, do you remember how the Earl of Claridge died?"

The question was so far removed from their current preoccupation with Roselli that he needed a few seconds to think it over. "I don't know that Smithers ever told us. What makes you ask?"

She seemed not to have heard his question. "I don't either. In fact it strikes me now that he left it out completely. And we were so excited about signing for your inheritance, we never noticed." A pause. Remington was about to resume his task, but then she went on musing. "I suppose if there was a suspicion of foul play, we would've heard at the time."

A mental half-step behind her—which was by no means uncommon-he was just beginning to grasp what she was driving at. And it wasn't pretty. "You're not suggesting that Roselli-? And the Earl? What the devil's in those files, Laura?"

"When I find out, I'll let you know. But I think they're the same ones I saw that night in Pico Union."

He'd have dropped his own search then and joined her, except that Murphy was signaling him from a credenza on the other side of the room. Judging by the lift of Murphy's eyebrow, the folder he handed over to Remington contained something of significance. "I hate to say it, but you were right," Murphy whispered.

Remington flipped the folder open. He cast a lightning glance over his shoulder at Laura, who was oblivious to them. He smiled.

Murphy had found the paperwork for a Cambridge condominium leased under the name Remington Steele.

* * *

The trick now was to keep his head on straight and not get too far ahead of the game. Remington had to tell himself that repeatedly during the return trip to their Boston hotel. No matter that part of him was primed to rush off straightaway to Cambridge, wherever that was, loaded gun at the ready. There were a couple of substantial obstacles standing in the way of success in his rejuvenated quest to finish off Roselli without Laura's involvement or knowledge. And until he was shut of them, it didn't do to let his emotions get the better of him-exactly his _modus operandi_ in too many situations with Roselli, always with deplorable results.

How to clue Roselli in to the Steeles' whereabouts, thus baiting the trap? That was the primary concern. Elaine Casselas was no longer to be depended on; Remington agreed with his wife on that score. Since Pennsylvania they'd detected no signs that their adversary had picked up their trail. It figured: the one instance when Remington actually wanted the bastard to appear out of thin air, Roselli was refusing to cooperate.

But there was time. Over forty-eight hours to the Marathon, to be precise. And if the comments Laura had passed were anything to go by, she was again leaning towards running, not as a decoy, but for the original reason Remington had planned it for her Christmas gift, simply to prove she could do it. It was almost a guarantee that they and Murphy were staying put, at least through the weekend.

With any luck—or, perhaps, the blessing of Providence—the weekend was all it would take, provided he could pull the wool far enough over Laura's eyes.

She was the second obstacle to his scheme, of course. Her shrewdness, her penetration and, yes, damn it, the fact that she knew him too well for his own good, intuiting his very thoughts almost before he thought them. Already he was wondering how in blazes he was going to hide what he was up to from her, especially in such close quarters as their room at the Eliot Hotel. In that respect the references to the Earl of Claridge she'd discovered in Roselli's files couldn't have cropped up at a more opportune moment.

Remington had to confess, once Murphy had unearthed the lease, any further remarks Laura had made about the Earl had gone in one ear and out the other. He was aware only that she was intrigued enough by the mystery to pull a thick stack of folders from a file drawer and coolly tuck them under her arm. "What's he going to do if he finds them missing?" she reasoned in the face of Murphy's objection. "Call the police?" It was with the same air of bravado that she carried them later across the parking lot to the Ford, as if daring someone—anyone!—who might be observing them from the shadows to emerge and stop her.

No one did. Safe in their hotel room, she changed directly into a pair of pajamas, foregoing her usual shower. With the files arranged to her satisfaction on the nightstand on her side, she climbed into bed next to Remington.

Her attitude, as well as the significance of her apparel, weren't lost on him. Strictly business, no romance. He stifled a sigh of regret. "A little light bedtime reading, I see," he commented.

She reached over and tousled his hair; he captured her wrist and, smiling, pressed her palm to his lips. "Get some sleep," she said fondly, and settled back to read.

She was still at it when he woke the next morning.

And plainly still engrossed. It needed his groaned, "Good God, Laura," for her to raise her head. "I didn't realize it was so late," she said on an up-note of wonder.

"Early, my love. Unconscionably so. But I take it you've found something."

"Plenty."

He could see it in her eyes, he thought, as she laid the papers aside and wrapped her arms around her knees: that gleam of excitement, coupled with the absorption that meant that on some subterranean level she hadn't paused for a second in her weighing and analyzing and deducing. And she was still fresh as a daisy in spite of her sleepless night. It was one of the things he loved about her.

"Right now, it's more questions than answers," she was saying. "Was the Earl of Claridge's death as innocent as it appears? What made him decide to leave you the castle? And most important, why does Roselli care about any of it?"

"You've come across proof he's involved?"

"Not proof, not yet. But instinct tells me he's up to his neck in it." She leaned over and kissed him. "First dibs on the shower, Mr. Steele."

Left to his own devices, it took him the habitual amount of stretching and popping his joints to fit him for rolling out of bed. At length he wandered over to the window and opened the drapes. Though his second-floor vantage point didn't allow for a panorama of the city, he did glimpse enough at street level to decide Boston seemed an interesting place. And there was reason to believe it would become a repository for good, possibly great, memories. If Laura were to excel in the Marathon…and the final showdown with Roselli took place just as he was envisioning it, the element of surprise firmly in place, he and Murphy dealing out just deserts, silent and implacable and lethal…

When the phone rang he picked it up absently. "Steele here."

"Bet you thought you'd seen the last of me," said a familiar baritone.

They were words Remington had heard before, spoken in the same order and with the same intonation. And for a moment they carried him back to the scene that had provoked them almost a year ago: the main staircase at Ashford Castle, the bulky figure accosting him at the foot of it, barring him from the garden where he was headed with Laura's pink sweater, the hoarse, whispered accusations of treachery, the murderous threats.

The caller was Tony Roselli.

TO BE CONTINUED


	13. PART I: Chapter 13

**A/N: Lest you feel dismay at chapter's end at the prospect of a chapter 14 devoted to a TV cliché, remember to expect the unexpected, the twist, the fan fic path not normally taken.**

**In other words…have faith. ;-}**

**~ MG**

Chapter 13

Once upon a time, when he was young and exceedingly foolish, years before he'd heard of Royal Lavulite, let alone conceived of following it on its 1982 tour of the States and falling head over ears for the beautiful, brown-eyed slip of a lass who was hired to protect it, the con man Harry had sat down to a game of poker in a private room at the casino in Évian-les-Bains with a notorious playboy and gambler called Andreas Del Vecchio.

It was a direct contravention of everything Daniel had taught him. For his engagement of Del Vecchio wasn't part of a grand design to steal a legendary painting or a fortune in gems. It wasn't even an attempt to cheat the man out of whatever money he had on him. Harry was, in fact, in pursuit of a bird of a different sort, an elusive contessa with a birthmark, a newly acquired settlement of fifty thousand lira from the noble third husband who'd just divorced her and a villa on the shores of Lac Léman, also the spoils of divorce. Things were going marvelously. He'd no need to cross swords with Del Vecchio.

Del Vecchio had goaded him into it. He'd fancied himself a contender for the affections of the fair Ippolita, Del Vecchio had, but since he was decades older than Harry and the after-effects of hard living were indelibly etched upon his person, he'd ended up much lower down in the ranks than he believed was warranted. If it were two or three centuries earlier, he'd have resorted to Daniel's preferred means for settling affairs of honor—pistols at forty paces-and called Harry out. As it was he had to settle for challenging Harry to play cards with him. The loser was to renounce his designs on Ippolita and retire from the field completely, no looking back.

And the winner? Well, he would take all: the woman, the lira and the villa, not to mention the evening's pot.

It was common knowledge that Del Vecchio played high. He also had a reputation for cheating. In Harry's pocket was three hundred francs, all the ready cash he had in the world.

He'd accepted.

It didn't surprise him in the slightest when Del Vecchio proposed five-card draw, a game one normally didn't find in Continental casinos. Nor was he surprised by the fifty-franc-minimum stakes, the variations Del Vecchio introduced "to spice the contest up " (one-eyes and jokers wild, aces low), the signs that Del Vecchio was palming cards he didn't like and replacing them with the ones he had up his sleeve, or that by the end of three hours he, Harry, was losing spectacularly. Somehow he'd expected nothing less.

What did bowl him over was his final hand. It was the sole natural straight flush he was ever to be dealt in his life, no cards drawn or discarded. He'd said a little prayer, saw Del Vecchio's bet but didn't raise him, looked him in smack in the eye, and with the boldest, most outrageous bluff he'd ever tried out on any opponent, convinced Del Vecchio he was holding three of a kind against Del Vecchio's full house.

And won.

Now, as Remington Steele, recognizing Roselli on the other end of the telephone line, he was experiencing the same feeling as the moment when he'd turned over that fifth card.

He made sure no trace of it carried over into his voice. "To the contrary, Antony. Mrs. Steele and I—well, I won't say we've been hoping you'd be in touch. But certainly expecting you."

"I hear you've been in Connecticut, poking your nose in things that don't concern you."

So it had worked as she'd intended, Laura's little plan to draw Roselli to them by means of Elaine Casselas. A pity Laura would never know it. Just to be on the safe side, Remington moved as far from the bathroom as the length of the phone cord would allow, even though the shower was pounding away behind the closed door.

With his own volume lowered, he said: "If you mean Miss Casselas, I beg to differ with you. You've been misusing my good name to seduce a girl too young to know better. That makes it very much my concern."

"And you just had to screw things up for me. Again."

It was a ferocious snarl. Was it possible that in his twisted fashion Roselli cared about the girl? Remington wondered. And that his picking up the phone wasn't for the purpose of launching the next step of his master plan, but an impulse, prompted by ungovernable anger?

It was worth exploring, at any rate.

"Turnabout's fair play," Remington replied. "Besides, you'd no business being with Miss Casselas in the first place. Not after what you did to Gladys Lynch. And Windsor Thomas."

"Yeah, she told me Laura told her about them. Big mistake, Steele. Huge."

"Ah, no, there's where you're wrong. The mistake was yours, underestimating my wife. She's a brilliant detective, one of the best. She found the gun you planted in our safe, in case you didn't know. It's in our possession even as I speak. Good luck pinning Windsor's murder on me without it."

Silence from Roselli. Hard to determine whether it was because he was preparing to ring off or because Remington had got his attention. The mention of the gun was spur-of-the-moment improvisation, meant to incite Roselli towards pursuit if his resolve was waning in any respect. But there was bait even more attractive, Remington suddenly realized, that would bring his nemesis to Boston on the double. The salvaging of Remington's plan. The guarantee of its success.

"And don't get me started on the Earl of Claridge," he said.

Was it Remington's imagination, or did his ears detect Roselli's sharp intake of breath, hastily muffled? "They've made for interesting reading, the files you keep in your so-called office," he went on. "No doubt the authorities would love to get their hands on them. Of course it's a little difficult for us to approach them now, since we're lacking the whole story, and I'm somewhat in their…bad graces. But once we've pieced it together? I'm sure they'll be willing to listen. Possibly they'll exonerate me on the spot. After all, the crimes you've framed me for pale in comparison to what you've done. Eh, Antony? Wouldn't you agree?"

A second ticked by, then another, and another. "Laura's dead, Steele," Roselli said. "And so are you."

A click, and so was the connection.

Remington had done it. He'd baited the line. And he'd hooked his fish, just as he had with Del Vecchio.

He'd have lingered on the spot, savoring what was undeniably a triumph, if it hadn't hit him in a rush that the noise of running water from the bathroom had ceased. He'd barely fumbled the handset back into the cradle before the door opened. "Who were you talking to?" Laura asked.

"Talking? Me? When?"

"Just now."

"Oh. That? Must've been the radio. East Coast news. Couldn't make heads or tails of it."

From beneath the towel turban she'd wrapped around her hair, she studied him with a level, faintly inquiring gaze. He looked back with his best imitation of wide-eyed earnestness—which was pretty damn near to the real thing, if he said so himself. A little frown marred the smoothness of her forehead; she seemed on the verge of saying something; then she turned without another word and went back to her grooming.

It nearly buckled his knees, the enormous sigh of relief he blew out.

He was on tenterhooks to deliver the good news to Murphy and proceed to the business of plotting joint surveillance of Roselli's office, but he didn't dare risk another phone call, not with Laura in the vicinity. Once she'd dressed, she unwittingly thwarted Remington's plans again. "We'll order breakfast from room service and ask Murph to come up," she said. "That way I can I bring you both up to speed on what I found in Roselli's files. If I'm right, it may be the key to locking him up for good."

"But I thought you said there isn't any proof connecting him with the Earl." This was Remington's last-ditch effort to manipulate her into a postponement.

"There isn't. We're going to bring it to light, Mr. Steele." And she smiled up at him with such confidence that he hadn't the heart to tell her she was wasting her time, that with any luck Roselli would be out of their lives forever by tomorrow morning, or Sunday at the latest.

He took care to carry on the charade throughout breakfast. It was fairly easy to pretend he was eager to help her brainstorm, given the breadth of the material she'd nicked from Roselli. "Detailed floor plans of Ashford Castle, for starters," she said, handing them to him. "Check out the date."

"Months before he insinuated himself into our honeymoon jaunt."

"There's a lot of detail here," said Murphy as he examined the schematics in his turn. "The kind you only pick up by seeing it in person."

"Exactly," Laura replied.

"No wonder he was able to navigate the castle so easily. Lord knows how many times he'd been there in the past," added Remington.

"Or what he was up to while he was there. Searching for something? Or…plotting an assassination attempt?"

"A little far-fetched, my love."

"Maybe. But Roselli drew up those plans months before the Earl died. Meanwhile he was on a mission to discover everything there is to know about the Earl. And not just the Earl." Laura held a tabbed manila folder out to Remington.

" 'George Beverley, eighth Earl of Claridge, Viscount Sotherton, Lord Finross'," he read from the label affixed to the tab. His glance flicked to his wife. " '1898 to 1969'. Our Earl's father?"

Laura was passing a similar folder across the table to Murphy. "Mm-hm. And this is the Earl we knew: James Beverley, ninth Earl of Claridge, Viscount Sotherton etcetera. 1928 to 1987."

"Perhaps Antony's merely a fan of obscure royalty. And he was betting against enormous odds our Earl would ascend to the throne.

"Considering he was twenty-fifth in the line of succession, it would've been quite a long shot, Mr. Steele. Say a million to one."

Murphy leaned forward in his chair. "Hang on, I got something. An hour-by-hour log of your Earl's activities. It covers"—here he riffled forward a few pages—"a week in April 1987. Know what that tells me? He had him under surveillance."

"I found copies of official transcripts of the Earl's public engagement diary for 1987, too," said Laura. "Where Roselli got them, I haven't figured out yet."

By now Remington didn't have to rely on his acting skills to feign engagement in the conversation; he was genuinely riveted by the mystery she was unfolding before their eyes. "My God, Laura. What if he did it? What if Roselli _did_ murder the Earl?"

"Then the question would be how, and why." Pushing away from the table, Laura rose and began to pace. "That file on the castle? It's not just floor plans. There's a complete history of ownership—probably excerpted from that book Mildred came across in the castle library. Remember, Mr. Steele? There's also a list of valuables. Everything from the eighteenth century pianoforte in the music room to the silver salt cellars in the butler's pantry."

"He was planning a heist, and the Earl got wind of it?" Remington suggested.

"It could be. But I'm guessing there's more to it than that."

"Unless he wants the castle, period," Murphy said slowly.

The Steeles were silent, waiting for him to elaborate.

"Think about it," he said. "He knows everything about it. He knows everything about the family that owns it. What if he was…I don't know…planning to take the Earl's place so he could get his hands on it? Just like he did with Steele?"

Pure conjecture, but the logic was sound. And it inspired Remington to fresh insight. Meeting Laura's eyes, he could see she shared his excitement. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" he asked her.

"Sean James?"

"Sean James. The Earl's missing illegitimate son," Remington added, addressing Murphy. "For a while it looked as if I might be him. Wrong color eyes, as it turned out. The Earl died before he could trace him-"

"—And left you the life interest in the castle instead-" Laura interjected.

"—Which would explain why Roselli's after you now," Murphy finished. "I knew it." His exultant tone wavered just shy of an I-told-you-so. "I knew there had to be more going on than Roselli getting revenge on you."

The energy in the room was electric, like bygone days, only better, because Remington was no longer the bumbling novice shunted to the sidelines to watch and learn as best he might, but an active contributor. He basked in the heady feeling—the old esprit de corps, he'd named it on the day they'd departed Denver-as Laura said, "Try this on for size. Roselli somehow learns of Sean James's existence. He cooks up a whole masquerade, pretending to be Sean, and presents himself to the Earl. Only the Earl's sharper than he expects, and isn't fooled. Maybe the confrontation turns violent. Roselli kills him and covers up the murder, making it look like an accident. All in a day's work for a former Army commando."

"And self-professed secret agent. But that still leaves one question. What the devil could he want with Ashford Castle?"

Laura paused in mid-stride and turned to him. Every inch the old Laura, she was, dedicated and gutsy, smart and savvy and entirely in control. Setting his resolve to achieve his private goals to one side, he could've seized her in his arms and kissed her to breathlessness at the unmistakable evidence of how far she'd bounced back from the blows Roselli had dealt her.

"That, Mr. Steele," she said, "is what I intend to find out."

* * *

The first step in the investigation was carried out that afternoon on a trip to the Boston Public Library, Central Branch.

It was while Laura was making the arrangements that Remington finally saw his chance to sidle up to Murphy and with faux nonchalance clue him in to Roselli's phone call. "I've a feeling he's headed straight for the office. The problem is how to divert Laura's attention so we can serve as his welcoming committee, so to speak."

Murphy, God bless him, had a failure-proof poker face of his own that he'd assumed without seeming to. "Relax," he said, never taking his eyes off Laura. "I know just how to handle it."

He did, too. As soon as Laura announced they would be spending the bulk of the day sifting through the library's microfilm archives, he begged off with the excuse of touching base with the Michaels Group. "I need to catch up on the new cases Mason's accepted," he added. "You guys'll do fine without me."

Laura was so busy packing up her supplies—and more to the point, engulfed in her strategizing-she didn't notice that Remington had accompanied Murphy into the corridor. En route to the elevator they rapidly finalized their plans. Murphy was to hire a second car from which to stake out Roselli's office building. Of course he would be armed. If anything developed, he would leave a message at Central Library's front desk; Remington was to check every half hour.

"What name should I leave it under?" Murphy wanted to know.

"Mike Vargas."

If Murphy recognized the abbreviated nod to an appropriate film, he didn't show it. He simply said, "You got it," and reached out to clap Remington on the shoulder. "We'll get him, Steele." And the elevator doors slid shut behind him.

It took scarcely thirty minutes at the library for it to sink in to Remington that circumstances had apportioned him the more emotionally arduous task in his and Murphy's division of labor.

Not the more dangerous nor even the more difficult; he wasn't so ridiculous as to believe that. There Murphy had him hands down, risking his life to an extent Remington would never have asked of him if he hadn't volunteered. He and Laura owed him a lot, their plodding, pedestrian but ever dependable friend. Possibly more than he, Remington, could repay.

Yet the bloody waiting was no picnic, either. Seated at one of the microfiche viewers, spinning the handle in a search for recent references to Ashford Castle in the major newspapers of his homeland, he couldn't contain his restlessness. Over and over he slipped away to wander the stacks, hands crammed in his pockets. Or else he stood gazing absently out one window or another, right ear lobe grasped between thumb and forefinger, wondering, wondering. Had Roselli surfaced? Had Murphy successfully spotted him? And when the hell was Murphy going to ring up the library with a report?

His misbehavior exasperated Laura. "For goodness' sake, Mr. Steele! Can't you sit still for five seconds?" she hissed under her breath. When it finally hit home this was getting her precisely nowhere, she opted to ignore him. Soon she was frowning at the screen of her own microfilm viewer, scribbling copious notes, heedless of her surroundings, absorbed. If her concentration was also meant as a tacit rebuke of his woeful lack of productivity, well, he'd just have to let her stew.

Thus did hour after tortuous hour creep past.

At a quarter past three there was still no word from Murphy. Not long afterward Laura began to gather her papers together and drop the spools of microfilm into the boxes in which they'd arrived. "Done already?" Remington demanded, incredulous.

She shrugged. "I've gone as far as I can without visiting the scene of the crime or questioning potential witnesses."

"Scene of the crime?" He held the street door open for her and followed her out. "Laura? Are you saying there's evidence Roselli murdered the Earl?"

"Running a little ahead of myself there. Sorry. The Earl was killed in a riding accident last April at the country estate of a friend of his, an MP named Arthur Draycott-Dawkins. Somehow he took a bad fall and hit his head. Only get this. He was riding alone some distance from the house. Nobody saw it happen."

Temporarily abandoning the matter that had been consuming him for half the day, Remington pondered this. "Wouldn't take much for a former soldier with an intimate acquaintance with explosives to spook a horse."

"Especially if he knew the Earl's whereabouts in advance and was tracking his movements. That hourly log Murphy found."

"The m.o. fits. Hitting his victim when he or she's more or less down. Yes, that's Antony's specialty."

The comment came out freighted with more bitterness and hostility than Remington considered safe. Swiftly he shot Laura a sidelong look to see if it had registered. He couldn't tell by her expression, but she did slide her free hand into his. They walked that way in silence for a few minutes while he fought the seemingly endless battle against his memories.

When he'd ruled himself the winner, at least of that round, he said: "So what's our next move?"

"We'll have to go over there, I think."

"What, to England?"

"And Ireland. Maybe. It all depends on what we find."

"You've absolutely decided against attempting to lure Roselli to the Marathon, then."

"Like I said yesterday: it's too late. Besides…" She trailed off, to all appearances lost in thought.

"Besides?" he prompted gently.

"For a while—a few days—we believed the Earl was your father. If there's justice to be had, I'd like us to be the ones to make it happen for him."

Her eyes were fixed on the far distance, but focused inward, on a future in which heinous wrongs, terrible evils, were inevitably put right. Recognizing the look, he gazed down at her, thinking how fine she was, how lovely and noble and upright. How utterly beyond price; how worth protecting, even, as he'd told her in September, to laying down his very life to keep her safe. No, Roselli would never touch her again, would not get so much as within a city block of her, not as long as Remington had the power to choose what was best for her, no matter how much she might deplore his over-protectiveness.

He wrapped his arm around her waist, hugging his secret to himself just as hard as he held her.

Back at the hotel, he parted from her in the lobby on the pretext of picking up a newspaper at the gift shop. But as soon as the elevator had swallowed her he made a beeline for the front desk. "Any messages for me? Steele, room 212."

The sight of the pink message slip sent his hopes soaring into the stratosphere.

Murphy's communication was short and to the point. _Subject on site. Call me 4 p.m. 555-0758. Will wait._

It wanted a few minutes to the four o'clock hour; Remington spent them striding up and down, up and down, near the bank of pay phones ranged on one side of the lobby. At four on the dot he was dialing with more speed than precision and was rewarded by Murphy's greeting. "Steele?"

"It's me."

"He showed up a little after three. Started carrying boxes out to his car a few minutes ago. Clearing out for good by the looks of it."

"On my way."

"Unh-unh. No sense in both of us hanging around doing nothing. Keep Laura occupied. I'll leave a message again if—when-he makes a move. Trust me, it's gonna be a while." Murphy rang off.

It rankled, the prohibition against leaping into action; Remington wanted to inveigh against Murphy's high-handedness. Then again, he had to admit he had his own hands full with his present assignment. Keep Laura occupied? More easily said than done, as Murphy well knew. It would take a healthy dose of ingenuity just to explain the length of Remington's absence to her.

"Where were you?" she asked the moment he set foot inside their room—fulfilling his prediction, sure enough. The brown eyes glinted as they traveled over him. "I thought you were buying a paper."

He'd forgotten. Damn. "Ah…nothing but bad news. Would've been tantamount to throwing our money away. I'll try the radio again, shall I?"

"I was going for a run anyway. Care to join me?" she smiled.

On second thought, perhaps distracting his wife wasn't too onerous a burden, after all.

Running together was useful for lulling her suspicions. So was the joint shower they indulged in upon their return. It was then that he started to remark the telltale signs of fatigue in her. What were the odds that she'd have pulled an all-nighter twenty-four hours before he needed to shepherd her to bed earlier than normal? Too astronomical to calculate, but he'd take them. Hell, yes, he would.

By seven-thirty, following a light supper, she was sleeping like a babe.

At slightly past eight the red message indicator at the base of the phone began to flash.

At ten past, having denied himself the pleasure of kissing Laura's cheek in farewell for fear of waking her, he was padding out of the hotel room with directions to a Cambridge address and the license plate number and description of Murphy's hired car in his hand.

And the Colt? It rode in the inner pocket of his leather jacket. Once or twice he patted it for reassurance or for luck, or, more likely, a little of both.

Never a man to be daunted by as small an inconvenience as driving in an unfamiliar city post-nightfall, he flattered himself he made a good job of it—a few missed turns and selecting the wrong bridge over the Charles were his sole mistakes. Arrived at his destination, he took the precaution of passing Murphy's hired Buick at three miles an hour: seeing and being seen. Murphy flashed his headlamps. Remington clicked the turn signal twice, right, left, in response.

The Ford he parked a couple of blocks away. As he started off on foot, a chill April wind, redolent of the river, nipped his ears and generally harassed him; he turned his collar up and smiled. It reminded him of London and the Thames. How many times had he trod those midnight streets in pleased anticipation of a healthy score? In comfortable satisfaction at a job neatly done? So many he couldn't recall them all.

None of them could compare to this excursion, nerves steady, conscience clear, to kill the man who'd caused Laura such grief and was continuing to threaten to rob her of her life.

"What's the story?" he asked Murphy as he shut the Buick's passenger door behind him.

"Well, let's see. After packing up the car, he spent the next two hours making stops. The bank…a storage facility…Federal Express…" Murphy paused. "The airport."

"Airline?"

"Northwest, from what I saw."

"So he is leaving town."

"Yep. The only question is when."

"There's no question about it. He means to leave when he's sent Laura and me to meet our Maker." Remington spoke lightly by design. "And now?"

"He seems to be buttoned up for the night. That's his condo over there."

It was, to Remington's surprise, a free-standing, one-story structure with an attached garage. Approximately a car's-length of space divided it from its neighbors. A single light burned in a front window.

With one accord Remington and Murphy settled down to wait. Murphy had managed to scrounge a thermos of coffee sometime during his journey; though it was on the lukewarm side, Remington drank gratefully. "Where'd you get this?"

"From the hotel. Why?"

"Because it's so like your resourcefulness, or what I remember of it. Always girded for action. Always prepared."

"Like a Boy Scout," Murphy agreed, and grinned

At half past ten the light in Roselli's condo window was extinguished. Murphy nudged Remington, as if to mark the significance of the moment. A darker darkness, relieved only by the streetlights, seemed to descend. Or perhaps it looked so because Remington was remembering the blackness of the heart of the man who now lay vulnerable and unprotected not many yards away. Dwelling on those memories, Remington was. Courting them on purpose.

There was no further conversation between him and Murphy until a quarter to midnight or thereabouts. It was Remington who abruptly broke the silence. "Would they convict, do you suppose?"

"Who?"

"The jury. If I'm caught…tonight, or sometime down the road…would they convict me?"

Wonderful, prosaic, literal-minded Murphy: he didn't bother to pat Remington's arm, or spin out soothing platitudes to mitigate the gravity of what they were about to do. Instead he chewed it over calmly. "They could," he replied at length. "Depends on your defense. And how good your lawyer is. But, Steele?"

"Yes?"

"Don't worry. You're not gonna get caught."

They exchanged a long, steely-eyed, resolute look.

At half past twelve Remington stirred. "Ready?"

Murphy nodded, drawing his gun from his jacket pocket. Remington did the same. Safeties off, fingers curled around the triggers, the two men emerged from the car.

It was the work of minutes to ascertain that the easiest ingress was through a large window at the rear of the condo. Here a wooden fence and a stand of cedars offered shelter and privacy. Whether there was an alarm or not, Remington wasn't certain; when he jimmied the window, they would know.

And then they were standing in the kitchen, as revealed by the penlight clamped between Remington's teeth. They didn't spare a glance for the layout or accoutrements; who cared? It was the bedroom they wanted.

There was a final detail to see to: drawing their guns, stowed away for the climb through the window, again. By the penlight's tiny beam they moved out into the hallway, Remington in the lead. Another memory flashed before him, this time unbidden, of that night on the road through Kentucky, of Murphy's offer, of the promise he'd made, of the strength of the handclasp on which they'd cemented their agreement to perpetrate this very deed…

At the doorway of the master bedroom Remington stopped thinking altogether. Handed the penlight to Murphy. Stepped over the threshold. Cocked the hammer. Crooked his forefinger around the trigger.

He would've pulled it, by God he would, if only the bed weren't empty.

Light flared. Murphy had hit the switch for the overheads. That was why the two comrades-in-arms could see it reflected in one another's faces as the implications of what had happened-how they'd been made, and played-hit them.

"Laura," said Remington. It was an anguished growl, and all he needed to say.

The trip back across the Charles was one to rival Remington's wild trajectory through Italy and France five months ago, except it was Murphy at the wheel, not he. At the Eliot, too wrought up to await the elevator, they bounded up two flights of stairs. And on reaching the second floor, this was what they saw:

The door to room 212 gaping wide. The interior exploded into chaos. Every light was blazing. Drawers had been yanked free of the dressers, upended, their contents pawed through and scattered. So with the Steeles' suitcases. The bedclothes had been torn from the mattress. Other furniture, chairs and nightstands and a standing lamp, lay on their sides or with legs in the air. The drapes and the window were open.

The files Laura had filched from Roselli's office were nowhere to be found, not in the bathroom, nor the closet, nor the bedroom.

Neither was Laura's handbag.

Neither was Laura herself.

Roselli had outthought them, outsmarted them and outmaneuvered them, and, when their backs were turned, struck.

As the stark truth stared him in the face, Remington clenched his fist, poised to smash the wall. Indeed, he could've beaten his head against it hard enough to make it bleed. It was the only remedy he could conceive against the runaway panic, the single thought that was pounding in him over and over, reverberating like an echo chamber in his head.

He'd failed her. He'd failed her. He'd failed her…again.

"He's got her," he bit out from between his teeth, not hearing the brogue that was thickening his speech. "He's got her, he's taken Laura, the murdering son of a whore."

TO BE CONTINUED


	14. PART I: Chapter 14

Chapter 14

If Laura hadn't turned towards Remington in her sleep, and discovered his side of the bed was empty, she might never have wakened at all.

Her last thoughts as she drifted off had been of the case. She couldn't help herself. There was so much to sift through! Granted, some of her preliminary deductions were a bit of a stretch, as her husband had pointed out. But that was the nature of the beast. That was why imagination and flexibility were so important in detective work—the ability to envision a thousand what ifs, and simultaneously stand ready to jettison the faulty nine hundred ninety-nine without batting an eye the second a shred of proof turned up to invalidate them. It was as far removed from mathematics as she was likely to get, and the reason she relished it so much.

They'd definitely made some progress today. A glow of satisfaction had warmed her at the recollection. In addition to learning the circumstances of the Earl's death, she'd already compiled a list of subjects to hit with questions as soon as she and Remington arrived in London. Catherine Beverley, née Galt, the widowed countess. Arthur Draycott-Dawkins, MP, and as many of the attendees of his house party, the one where Lord Claridge had died, as the Steeles could convince to talk to them. Whichever of Draycott-Dawkins' staff usually cared for the horse The Earl was riding. The doctor or coroner who'd pronounced his death. Maxwell Beverley, his first cousin once removed and inheritor of the title, as well as Maxwell's wife, Portia.

And Roderick Smithers of Smithers, Smithers & Tennyson, solicitors.

There was no doubt in Laura's mind that the "Remington Steele" who'd contacted Smithers last month to spill the beans about the deed of gift to Ashford Castle's former servants was none other than Roselli. She wasn't quite as clear about his motive, not yet. But the incident did seem to prove he was intimately acquainted with the terms of Lord Claridge's bequest to Remington. Did that mean he'd actually, physically, seen the entire will? If he had, how had he managed it? By stealth, breaking into Smithers' office? Or was Smithers a co-conspirator, willing to betray his client the Earl for a share of whatever Roselli was really after?

In the meantime, assuming Roselli really _had_ attempted to pass himself off to the Earl as Sean James, she'd revised her theory on the sequence of events. It didn't necessarily follow that Roselli had murdered the Earl as soon as His Lordship figured him for an impostor. He wasn't that rash. No, his standard m.o. was months and months of careful preparation, and then catching his target totally off guard, like he'd done with her and Remington. The Earl had died in April 1987. She didn't think she was off base in positing a date for his initial confrontation with Roselli as far back as six months prior, or even earlier.

She'd also begun to wonder whether there was a tie-in with Remington's search for his father that was worth exploring.

It wasn't easy, dredging up memories of that time. May to September, 1985: the most painful period of her life, when she'd gone without so much as a cable or phone call from the man she'd reluctantly grown to love, the electronic trail Mildred had tracked across the globe the sole reassurance he was still alive. Days of Laura putting on her game face, the one that said she was better off without him, and struggling to convince Mildred she believed it. Nights in which she wrestled with regrets over lost opportunities to make love to him and with too-vivid dreams that mocked the emptiness of her arms. She'd tortured herself endlessly with images of him cavorting with a series of interchangeable, busty, bubble-headed blondes on the sun-drenched beach of some Mediterranean playground. She'd been hurt and angry and conflicted. And all the while he was trying in his bumbling, fumbling way to solve the thirty-three-year-old mystery of the initials inscribed on an old pocket watch—a quest she might've helped him with, if only they'd had the guts in those days to be honest with each other.

Had his path ever crossed Roselli's during those weeks in London? Had hers, once she arrived to bring Remington home? She couldn't recall anything out of the ordinary. But the possibility had raised a cold prickle along her spine. Were they more fortunate than they realized to have returned unscathed to Los Angeles to pick up their romance where they'd left off? Or was that breathing space part of Roselli's plan, too?

One thing she was positive of. The errand Roselli had devised for Remington, sending him to Paddington Station a year ago to liaison with suspected turncoat Miles Helmsley? She'd pegged it correctly as an attempt at cold-blooded murder. Why Roselli had subsequently helped her and Remington fight off The Greek and his henchmen, she still couldn't explain. But the fact remained that he'd neatly engineered a repercussion-free method of disposing of his rival for Ashford Castle with no one the wiser. God knew, blinded as she was to Roselli's character, she would've swallowed it unquestioning.

And there she would've been: cheated out of the opportunity to tell Remington she was so in love with him she couldn't see straight, or mend the lingering rifts in their relationship, or take him to bed and explore every gorgeous inch of him at long, long last—a widow after barely a week of marriage, beguiled by her husband's murderer…

Outrage had burned in her, fresh as the day she'd first recognized the trap she'd almost fallen into. Earlier she'd told Remington that she was after justice for the Earl. It was the truth, but only part of it. The rest she'd admitted last October in an emotionally charged conversation he probably didn't remember. She'd never forgiven Roselli for Paddington Station, was what she'd said then; she never would. Everything he'd done since was just extra incentive. She'd win the satisfaction of putting him behind bars if it took the rest of her life.

Heartened and calmed in equal measure by that resolve, she'd fallen asleep.

When she woke four hours later, startled by Remington's absence, it never occurred to her to suspect he was up to something. Nor did it strike her as odd that Murphy didn't pick up when she called his room. The guys—her guys-were getting along so well, it wouldn't have surprised her if they'd met up in the bar downstairs for a nightcap. Maybe if she hurried she could join them. She wasn't so tired after all. Besides, she'd missed out on that rainy night in Indiana and the bottle of Maker's. And she was dying to tell Murphy the story of her and Remington stumbling across that office in San Diego, an perfect replica of their own, and the bizarre circumstances that had produced two Remington Steeles, two Laura Holts and a mad scramble for a package containing a pornographic videotape that could've brought down a popular TV evangelist's career if he hadn't turned to murder first.

She almost left Roselli's files behind, she was in such a rush to leave. But at the last second she turned back. She'd gone as far as she could with them for the time being, and tomorrow and the next day she'd be too occupied with the Marathon to work more than sporadically. Wouldn't it make sense to stow them somewhere secure? The hotel safe, for example? Swayed by her own irrefutable logic, she scooped up the papers and headed for the lobby.

The sharp-dressed twenty-something on duty at the front desk gave her some grief and even more lip about accessing the safe at that hour. It took her unshakable insistence on seeing the manager to get the service she wanted. He was a nice guy, personable and inclined to chat. "In town for the Marathon, Mrs. Steele?" he asked while he filled out the appropriate paperwork for her.

"As a matter of fact, I'm running in it. My husband signed me up behind my back. Christmas present," she added in response the manager's puzzled look.

"First time?"

She nodded. "I'm a little nervous."

"Nothing to it." He extended his hand. "Gary Danko. This'll be my fifth in a row."

"In that case, you wouldn't have a few tips you could share, would you?"

They segued into a discussion of the route, the pace and what she could expect from the competition, until at length Laura excused herself to peek into the half-empty bar. She didn't see Remington or Murphy anywhere. A quick conversation with the bartender confirmed that they hadn't been in that evening.

It was too soon to say she was worried; mystified was a better description for what she was feeling. Where could Remington have gone? She could rule out involvement in some risky escapade, thank goodness, since he was with Murphy. But it was totally out of character for him to take off without letting her know.

It was a silent testimony to how far they'd come in their relationship, that she could think the latter thought without a trace of irony.

Gary Danko hailed her as she passed the front desk en route to the elevator. "Mrs. Steele? I just had two calls complaining of a disturbance on the second floor. Loud noises coming from your room-"

Remington, she immediately thought. Trepidation gripped her. She checked her stride.

"—so would you like me to follow you up? Or if you could wait a minute-"

And open them up to official scrutiny, maybe a police investigation, if something really was wrong? Not on his life. She started walking again, unobtrusively picking up speed. "I appreciate the concern," she tossed breezily over her shoulder, "but it's probably my husband, looking for me. We'll let you know if there's a problem." And she stepped into the first car available, effectively quenching further comment.

One potential dicey situation avoided. She leaned back against the elevator wall, not so much in relief as to gear up for whatever lay in store for her on the second floor. Suddenly she wished the agency gun wasn't concealed in the locked cargo compartment of the Fleetwood, miles away in a Hamden garage. Of course the need for firepower would be moot if Remington had returned.

But if he hadn't? Where the hell was he?

The elevator opened on an empty corridor. Silence reigned. Still, keying her lock, she noticed from the corner of her eye that the door of the room across the hall and the one adjacent were cracked a few inches. "It's me, dear," she called, pitching her voice to ear-piercing sweetness. "I bet you had one of your fits while I was gone, didn't you? I know, I know-we're a few minutes late with your medication, and you probably got a little antsy. Well, you just leave it to Mama-I'll be with you in a jiffy-"

From behind her came the sound of two doors closing and the deadbolts sliding into place. She smiled. That ought to fix their nosy neighbors.

A veteran of numerous uncensored crime scenes, she wasn't a woman who rattled easily. But the sight that greeted her as she crossed the threshold of room 212 had the power to elicit a gasp from her. For a moment she stood rooted to the spot, hand clapped over her mouth.

It wasn't the mess. That she could've coped with. It was the palpable malevolence with which their belongings, hers and Remington's, had been ransacked. Their clothing wasn't only tumbled from drawers and suitcases; it looked like it had been torn at by a pair of frenzied hands, and then flung to the floor and stomped upon. A deliberate statement of the treatment she and Remington might have received, were they within reach of those hands? She didn't know how it could be interpreted otherwise.

Breaking her paralysis—it hadn't lasted longer than five seconds-she advanced farther into the room. Her right foot slipped on something, and she recognized pages from the two novels she'd left on the dresser, ripped from their bindings and tossed to the floor. In the bathroom she found toiletries emptied into the sink, tubes twisted, bottles and jars smashed. Thick smears of lipstick and clots of toothpaste soiled the countertop. In comparison the bedroom's upended furniture and strewn bedclothes seemed almost a benign prank.

What sickened her most was the condition of Remington's sketchbook. With hands atremble she retrieved it from the corner where it lay. A third of it had been reduced to confetti that dotted the carpet between the bed and window. Intact sheets were defaced by heavy black scrawls. Torn leaves were scattered here and there, abandoned and forlorn; stooping to retrieve a couple, she saw they were part of the drawing Remington had done of her at the Hamlet Motel several weeks before.

Roselli. From the first she'd feared this was his handiwork, and now she was sure: a random vandal or thief wouldn't have given a damn about the sketchbook. She'd lured him to Boston through Elaine Casselas, exactly as she'd planned. Except that he'd arrived a day and a half too soon, and manifested his presence with a violence that shouldn't have shocked her nearly as deeply as it had.

Thank God, thank God, Remington had left his portfolio behind in the Fleetwood, or who knew what that monster would've done to the body of work they were both so proud of? Thank God she'd had the smarts to hide the Claridge files! She and Remington had had a close call, a narrow shave, and they had a hell of a mess to clean up, but for this round of the game the score was Steeles: all; Roselli: nothing.

So what was she doing here, cowering in a corner, when she should be hunting for clues that would tell her how he'd perpetrated this brazen example of breaking and entering?

Not by the door; its lock proved impervious to the trial-by-pick to which she subjected it. Unless Roselli had somehow stolen a key, she couldn't see how he'd managed it. The window was hardly more feasible, given the two-story drop. Purely for the sake of argument she opened the casement and leaned over the sill to measure the distance.

That was when her gaze met that of the masculine figure standing in the shadows on the opposite side of the street.

Instantly her instincts were firing on all cylinders. Witness? Accomplice? Or a cleverly disguised Roselli? Whatever he was, she was damned if she was going to lose him.

It was a good decision. The problem was in the follow-through. For though she bypassed the elevator in favor of the stairs, and was on the street within five minutes of first spotting him, the mystery man had disappeared.

But he couldn't have gone far. Swiftly she set off east on Commonwealth, the street she was most familiar with. Despite the late hour, there was a lot of foot traffic-whether due to the upcoming race, or just typical of a Friday night in Boston, she couldn't say. Head up, posture alert, air of competence sheathing her like armor, she scanned the face of each passerby while still keeping tabs on pedestrians traveling in the same direction as she. In the brief glimpse she'd had of her quarry, her practiced eye had registered that he was tall, over six feet, and wearing a dark overcoat and a cap. But ten minutes of determined stalking failed to yield a sign of him.

She slowed. It was too late now to backtrack and try picking up the scent at the point of origin, she had to admit. And what if Remington finally turned up? He'd be worried sick, frantic, when he was confronted by the mess in their room and found her missing…

As fast as an eyeblink, the wife of Steele supplanted the sleuth. The thought of his distress blotted out all other concerns. Whirling abruptly, she broke into a run.

They collided on the Eliot's second floor as she exited the elevator.

There wasn't a moment to think. A flash of his face, dead white against the darkness of hair and beard, and of Murphy on his left, and then Remington had her in his arms and was crushing her to his chest. "Oh, my God," he rasped. "Laura—thank _God_-"

Those were the last intelligible words she was to get out of him for a while, beyond a muffled "baby" or "angel" or two. That was because he'd tipped her face up and was covering it with kisses. And he was shaking hard, as hard as the night she'd proposed the plan that had brought them here in the first place, and his anger had burst the bonds of self-control, bringing to light the poison that had been festering in him since their aborted showdown with Roselli in Pico Union.

Just as she had then, she held him tight. "I'm fine," she whispered over and over through the lump in her throat, stroking the back of his neck. "It's okay, sweetheart. I'm all right."

Goodness knows how long they might've stood clinging together, if Murphy hadn't shuffled his feet and coughed discreetly. "Uh, guys? Don't let me interrupt. But your room's kind of a disaster area—and if you were hoping to get some sleep tonight…"

It was an excellent wake-up call. After a final squeeze she gently disengaged herself from her husband's arms. "Okay?"

"Okay," he agreed, and grasped her outstretched hand.

During the walk to their room, he quickly recovered the use of his voice. "I thought he'd taken you, Laura," he said. "Roselli."

"I know."

"I should've known he'd come looking for those files, so I should. I thought he'd taken them…and you with them…"

"Well, I'm happy to report he never laid a hand on either one of us." She explained how she'd disposed of the files, and why. "Where were you guys, anyway? I've been looking all over for you."

"Oh…out and about."

The vagueness of his reply wasn't only dissatisfying; it pricked her attention, and not in a pleasant way. The whole time they were surveying the damage Roselli had done and launching the clean-up, her subconscious kept returning to it, like a fingernail to a persistent itch. Gathering their scattered clothing and putting it back into a semblance of order while the men righted the furniture, she felt the disquiet transforming into something else. Something speculative…something distrustful.

His and Murphy's prolonged, unexplained absence. Remington hanging back in the lobby this afternoon to buy a paper, but entering their room empty-handed. His restlessness and inattention at the library.

Go on, she prompted herself silently.

He'd answered a phone call that morning. That she was convinced of, though he'd denied it. Could the caller have been—she flinched at completing the thought-Roselli?

Yes. It could. And that meant Remington had lied to her. Bold as brass, without an ounce of shame, as slickly as he ever had.

What had he said a few minutes ago? 'I should've known he'd come looking for those files.' Like it was a foregone conclusion, the rational choice for Roselli to make under the circumstances, instead of a stroke of purest coincidence.

Like someone had tipped Roselli off.

She couldn't remember the last time she'd been this furious with her husband. No wonder he looked dazed and horrified as he took her in his arms by the elevator. Never mind why he'd done it; he was wracked by the guilty knowledge that he was indirectly responsible for the vandalism of their room and her supposed abduction.

Speaking slowly—it was the only way to keep a lid on her anger—she said: "Mr. Steele? What made Roselli come here for the files?"

Head partly turned away, he didn't answer immediately, attention riveted by something he held in his hands. His sketchbook. A rush of mingled grief and sympathy assailed her at the unhappy twist of his mouth, the tension in his jaw.

This was no time to turn into sentimental mush on his account, she admonished herself. "Mr. Steele?"

"Hm? Miss Cassleas, no doubt. Your plan worked just the way you meant it to."

"I'm not asking how he knew where to look. I'm asking why he knew what to look for."

He glanced up and into her eyes. His own narrowed for a moment. Then they flew wide in comprehension.

She had him. And he knew it.

"Laura," he said. "It's not what you're thinking."

"It's not?"

"No. And I can explain—"

"That would be a start. The sooner, the better."

"All right." He sucked in a deep breath. "This morning? When you thought you heard me on the phone? It was Antony at his finest. Not at all happy we've spilled the beans about Windsor and Gladys Lynch to Miss Casselas, threatening to kill us both…"

He paused, giving her space to respond, but she didn't take him up on it, so he plowed resolutely on. "You were still wavering about running in the Marathon, or so it appeared to me. And I needed a ploy to lure him here. So I…hinted…that we'd found potentially damning information in his Claridge files…something we were on the verge of revealing to the local constabulary."

Here Remington shot a glance at Murphy. Their friend was looking extremely uncomfortable, Laura noted, as if he would've preferred any spot on the planet to the one he was currently occupying. The expression intensified as Remington went on: "We'd—Murphy and I—had already turned up a local address for him-"

"When was this?"

"Last night. So we thought we'd stake out his office, and then his condo, to try and nab him…under the radar, as it were…."

He was winding down, his voice faltering under the influence of her deepening frown. "…only he slipped through our fingers," he finished.

In the silence that followed, he offered a tentative, lopsided, placating grin. It was no good. Her fury had already risen to such towering proportions, she felt as if her physical stature had increased accordingly until her inches outstripped her husband's.

Apparently he recognized it. The smile faded; he stood braced for the onslaught. Meanwhile Murphy was eying him with what looked a hell of a lot like commiseration, which made her even madder.

She started quietly enough. "Let me get this straight. Our worst enemy-the one who didn't rest until he dug up our deepest, darkest secrets—who's using what he knows to take over our business, destroy our reputation and frame you for murder-contacts us directly for the first time in seven months? And your reaction is to clue him in that we're investigating maybe the biggest crime he's gotten away with to date?"

"Yes, well, if you want to put it like that, I suppose I-"

"You knew he was in town, and _you didn't tell me_?"

"Yes, but I-"

"_You have his home address? And you didn't tell me_?"

By now she was yelling. Murphy winced. "I know you're pissed, Laura, and you probably have a right to be, but could you keep it down? You're gonna wake up the whole hotel."

She glared at him—whose side was he on, anyway?—and then rounded on Remington again. "And just what were you hoping to accomplish, confronting him tonight?"

"I-"

"Let me guess. Making sure he never touches me again? Meanwhile you could've been arrested! You could've been killed!"

At least he didn't try to deny the charge. Instead his brows twitched together in the beginnings of irritation. "Granted, yes, I might, but would you mind letting me get a word in edgewise, please?"

The comment wasn't worth the breath she would've wasted on it. "And what did you think _you_ were doing, helping him?" she asked Murphy. But he only hemmed and hawed and cut his eyes at Remington in a mute appeal.

And that was when it happened: they exchanged the kind of look she hated most, it was so infuriatingly masculine, composed of exasperation and exaggerated patience and a faint but definite vein of superiority.

Suddenly she'd had it up to there with both of them. She couldn't stand the sight of their stupid, smug, condescending, manly faces. Whipping around on her heel, she made for the only refuge available. The bathroom door slammed behind shut her with a satisfying crash.

She didn't come out until she heard the door to the corridor open and close, and she'd waited another twenty minutes by her watch after that.

But the bedroom's stillness didn't signify what she assumed it had. Remington wasn't asleep. Lounging in the armchair, arms folded, he sprang up as soon as she appeared. "Laura, we need to talk."

That was a switch. He could knock himself out as far as she was concerned, as long as he didn't expect any response from her. Pointedly she averted her eyes and swept past him towards her side of the newly made bed.

"You can't ignore me forever. And now's just as good a time as any."

Couldn't she? They'd see about that. She folded the spread down and draped it over the foot of the bed, brushing him aside when he hovered too near her elbow.

"At least give me a hearing, eh?"

She plumped up her pillow and prepared to hop into the sack; he took her by the arm. "Laura-"

"_Don't_."

The single fierce syllable was enough to persuade him to drop his hand. He even backed up a few steps. But it was a temporary concession, and not an admission of defeat; he made that clear with the last words he uttered. "We'll talk in the morning."

Probably he would've brought the conversation about by the sheer force of his charm if she hadn't been such an astute observer of his patterns of avoidance for past five years, and adopted them to her advantage the next day. Up and about before he stirred; a hasty breakfast in the hotel restaurant; solitary window shopping and sightseeing in the Back Bay; a jog up to Beacon Hill and through Boston Common. It was three in the afternoon when she decided to return to the Eliot. There she found an immaculate room, and in it a Remington Steele who was piecing his ruined sketches back together, and visibly fuming at having the tables turned on him so neatly.

Without sparing him a glance she dug out the new paperback she'd picked up during her shopping excursion and stretched out on the bed to read. The silence that fell practically simmered with the heat of their mutual hostility. But she was damned if she was going to save him from the punishment of sweating it out.

He was never one to shrink from a potential fight—not with her, anyway. Finally he said: "How long do you plan on keeping up the silent treatment, Laura? Hm?"

"It depends." She turned a page. "How long do you plan on going behind my back whenever you don't get your way?"

He didn't care for that at all, that passionate, hot-headed man of hers. She heard the soft rustle as he donned his leather jacket and zipped it up. And then it was his turn to communicate his displeasure by a means of a door-slam and a precipitous retreat down the hall.

Weirdly, as the afternoon waned, it was Murphy who undertook the role of peacemaker.

Unlike with Remington, Laura was already half inclined to forgive him his share in yesterday's fiasco as soon as she answered his knock at the door. He seemed to sense it, too. "Hey, partner," he said. "You speaking to me?"

His attitude was such a comical mix of sly and sheepish, it coaxed a laugh from her. "I suppose I could be convinced."

She snagged a couple of cans of Coke from the in-room fridge and handed him one. "Where's Steele?" he asked, popping the top.

"Out sulking somewhere. Don't tell me he sent you up here."

"What? No. I haven't seen him all day."

"Not such close conspirators after all, huh?"

He winced at the sarcasm the same way he had last night at her anger. "Ouch."

"You know you deserved it."

"I guess I do, at that."

They sipped at their cokes, for a few minutes relishing the warmth of restored companionship.

"What happened, Murph? You were supposed to looking out for him, not aiding and abetting him." A reproachful note crept into her voice. "You promised me."

"I know. I'm sorry. It's the last thing I expected, seeing his side of the story. It's just…" Murphy hesitated.

"What?"

She could've sworn that the tide of red seeping upwards from his collar was due to embarrassment, and not shame. He was having trouble maintaining eye contact, too. "Spit it out," she said.

"He told me the truth. About that time Roselli broke into your office. What Roselli did to you."

Had Murphy confided he was turning to fraud and theft to earn a living, he couldn't have surprised her more. Considering Remington's previous insistence on total secrecy, the implications of his confession to Murphy were huge. All she could say was: "Oh."

"That's one sick, twisted bastard, Laura."

No argument there, she told him.

"I don't blame Steele for feeling like he does. If it were me…I think I would've done the same thing."

"You'd take the law into your own hands?"

"No. But I'd do what I could to stop Roselli." Murphy regarded her over his soda can for a moment. "You're still pretty mad at him, aren't you? Steele?"

"It isn't just what he planned to do, or the way you two snuck off. It's the lies. That's what gets to me." It really was the crux of the issue; realizing it, she put her head in her hands. "Every time I start to think he's changed-really changed-we're back to square one. I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't a lost cause."

"I wouldn't be too sure about that."

"What do you mean?"

"That's what I came to tell you. I didn't see it at first…maybe he didn't want me to, I don't know. We never were each other's biggest fans-"

"You can say that again."

"That guy—you were right about him. He _has _changed."

It wasn't only what he said, but the way he said it, that convinced her that he wasn't just defending Remington out of some notion of masculine solidarity. He really believed it. And, yesterday aside, she knew she could trust Murphy not to lie to her.

She said: "You think so?"

"Yeah, I do." He held up a warning hand. "That doesn't mean I totally buy into his act. Or that I'm not gonna call him on his crap when he gets out of line. But when it comes to you, he's not scamming. So cut him some slack. He deserves it, Laura."

They were the most positive remarks Murphy had made over the course of his acquaintance with Remington, and what she'd hoped would develop after that ugly scene in Denver. At last Remington had earned respect from the quarter from which he'd always yearned for it! She wondered if he suspected, and how he would react when he heard.

But she'd forgotten Murphy's talent for reading her, borne of their long friendship. "Ugh, I can't believe I said that," he groaned. "You're not going to tell _him_, are you?"

"Don't worry, your secret's safe with me."

There wasn't a lot left to discuss after that; soon she was walking him to the door. "So are you running tomorrow, or what?" he wanted to know.

"I'm not sure. Now that we've seen for ourselves that Roselli's in town…we haven't had time to prepare."

"Well, when you know what the game plan is, give me a call. I'd kind of like to be there, you know? Me and Steele, cheering you on. And, partner? Think about what I said?"

He leaned down to kiss her cheek. And then he was off, whistling jauntily, down the hall.

Leaving her to do as he'd asked: to think it over.

There was an entire long, lonely, Remington-less evening to do it in.

* * *

It was past midnight, and Laura was still awake.

So was Remington, she knew.

They were turned on their sides away from each other, each as close to his or her edge of the bed as they could possibly be without falling off. Between them stretched a no-man's land of empty mattress, the greatest amount of distance to divide them since they'd begun sharing a bed. So far neither had attempted to breach it.

Laura wanted to. She really did. She just didn't know how to make the gesture without leaving it open to misinterpretation. Remington might construe it as a call for a truce, or an apology. He might jump to the conclusion that he was off the hook for his supreme stupidity. And there he would've been dead wrong.

No, she couldn't excuse what he'd done. It was foolhardy, reckless and self-indulgent. But she could understand why he'd done it—and, perversely, though it violated all her liberated feminine principles, love him for his chivalry.

But how could she convey it without compromising her position?

She was still weighing and analyzing the question when there was movement beside her. It was Remington turning over to face her. His right hand reached across the gap and began to travel over her shoulder and down.

Quiescent beneath his palm, she lay with held breath. The caress wasn't a prelude to sex, she didn't think; it was more like he was simply savoring the contours of her body, the texture of hair and skin, through his fingertips. Finally he hooked his arm around her waist and pulled her against him. There was the soft prickle of his beard and the warmth of his mouth as he nuzzled her ear.

And then he murmured into it: "You mean everything to me."

She sighed. It was the declaration of a man who would never express his inmost feelings easily, no matter how much intimacy they achieved in their relationship. Months ago she'd made her peace with it. By now she was learning to appreciate the inversion of his glibness. The less forthcoming he was on the subject, the more truly his emotions were invested, was how she looked at it.

He was a complicated man. Theirs was a complicated love affair. But she wouldn't have traded it—or him-for any amount of peace or security or cheap, superficial adoration.

So she rolled over so that they were nose to nose. "I know."

The blue eyes searched hers, diffident now, no longer defiant. "I never dreamt it would happen the way it did. I swear I didn't. Though if I had it to do over-"

"Stop right there." She laid her forefinger on his lips. "We'll talk about it later. No, scratch that. _I'll_ do the talking, you're going to listen. Later." As a form of punctuation she jabbed his breastbone with the same finger. "I'm serious, Mr. Steele."

He grabbed the offending finger and took it gently between his teeth. "Of course you are." The words were solemn, but the familiar cheeky smile was tugging at his lips.

How could she resist? She had to kiss him. And if that meant abdicating her principles for the time being, well, those didn't do much to keep a woman warm on a cool Boston night.

But there was one omission she needed to rectify. "I'm sorry about your drawings," she said softly as they surfaced from the kiss.

"Mm-hm." His hands were wandering again, and oh, yes, their intent was sexual, if their work on the buttons of her pajama top were any indication. "Paper and ink, Laura. They can be replaced. But the original—ah, she's a different story." He pushed her onto her back and bent down to her, bearded mouth whispering against her throat. "Mine to hold…" He was kissing his way down to her breast; she shivered in anticipation of the sensations he would awaken once he'd reached his destination. "Mine to touch…mine to love…"

He'd arrived. He was there. And then he began to speak to her in that other language, the one in which he was completely fluent, telling her with his eyes and hands and lips and all the rest of him that no woman on earth could compare to her, he loved her with his whole heart, and there was nothing he wouldn't do for her if she needed him…

And if they'd provoked Roselli to desperation by their inquiry into Lord Claridge's death, and were ever more firmly fixed in his sights, and the whole complicated investigation loomed ahead of them, and they hadn't remotely begun to tackle the weight of suspicion that hung over Remington, let alone rehabilitate their reputation, those considerations could be set aside until morning.

Tonight they had each other. And that was enough.

To paraphrase Remington: it was everything.

END PART I

TO BE CONTINUED

**A/N: I hope the resolution to chapter 13's cliffhanger didn't disappoint. What I was referring to with my cryptic comment about "the fan fic path less taken" was the kidnapping trope, i.e. Laura in Roselli's clutches, waiting for Remington to save her. One of the reasons I loved the series so much was that the writers for the most part avoided that plot device; I've tried to do the same in my fiction, except in cases where it served to illuminate an advance in the Laura-Steele relationship. In this story it seemed to me that more character growth—and seeds for future complications—would result from keeping Laura free and safe.**

**There are more twists and turns to come as the Steeles embark for England. Please stay tuned for them. And, as always, thank you for continuing to read.**

**A/N2: Something about Laura's and Murphy's conversation has been bugging me. Murphy's side felt incomplete, somehow. I've tweaked it a little since first posting, nothing major, but adding a little more depth before he takes his (for the moment) final bow on my little stage, and we bid him _au revoir_ (because with any luck, he'll turn up again.)**  
**~MG**


	15. PART II:  Chapter 1

**A/N: Welcome to Part II! Thank you for continuing to read. Thank you also to everyone who has commented either by PM or in a public review. Please know that the reason I haven't thanked you personally is for fear of becoming a pest—not because I'm ungrateful. Your kind words, interest and enthusiasm mean a lot to me.**

**Individual thanks to lilyraines and MJW who've left wonderful reviews, but whom I'm unable to contact via PM. I appreciate very much that you took the time to do so.**

**~ MG**

PART II

Chapter 1

From his carefully selected aisle seat slightly more than halfway back, Flannery watched the Steeles board the plane.

It was in preparation for this moment that he'd timed his arrival at the British Airways gate at Logan International down to the last millisecond. As soon as the flight to London was called, he'd queued up with his boarding pass. He'd already pulled the strings that accorded him the optimal vantage point, where he could see without being seen, not only now before take-off, but while they were in the air. Now it was a matter of putting it to good use.

Twelve hours of continuous observation could be very, very valuable. They might even mean the difference between life and death. Not his: the Steeles'.

Soon enough, there was Steele with an earpiece and cane, leaning on the arm of a solicitous stewardess. You had to give him his props; only an expert could've told that powder, not old age, whitened his hair and beard. And he had the mannerisms down, the cocked head and too-loud monotone of the slightly deaf, the squint over the top of his wire-rimmed glasses. The lines around his eyes and mouth were the finishing touch.

Mrs. Steele-or Laura, as he'd unapologetically taken to calling her in his head—was almost the last to come through the door. Picture-perfect in a traditional, floor-length black habit, that's what she was, her pretty hair hidden beneath the matching veil. It was the first time he'd really seen her freckles, which he decided were very appealing. She offered a gentle smile and a "God bless you, my son" to the fellow who scrambled up to relieve her of her carry-on bag and stow it in the overhead luggage bin. Totally in character. He ought to know.

Apart from their clever disguises, what really marked her and her husband as pros was the way they related to each other. Which was to say they didn't. Steele never looked up from the in-flight magazine he'd pulled from the seat pocket in front of him. Laura's eyes never sought his as she moved up the aisle.

But they did meet Flannery's.

Met them, swept past him and then returned. A little vertical crease cleft itself between her brows. It was plain she was wondering where she'd seen him before, but couldn't quite place him.

One of the stewardesses chose that moment to come up behind her and touch her sleeve. Breaking eye contact, Laura turned and exchanged a few words with her before taking her seat. Flannery was forgotten.

He let his breath hiss out from between his pursed lips with a low whistling sound.

The flight was maybe half full, providing him excellent sight lines for monitoring his subjects, but the disappointing truth was there wasn't much to see. Steele opted for the headphones the stewardess offered and sat evidently enraptured by ninety-two minutes of _Beetlejuice_. As for Laura, Flannery surmised from the position of her right arm—her aisle seat was four rows ahead of his—that she was reading. Idly he speculated about the title of the book, an intellectual exercise he often indulged in for his private amusement. It was useful in his profession, too. He was a firm believer that a man or woman's reading material spoke volumes about his or her character. Pun intended.

This Laura Steele: she was an intelligent girl, one who would pass over the light stuff in favor of substance. No bodice rippers for her, both because she was smart and because it would've undermined her cover. He'd seen enough of her from afar to presume she would pay attention to those kinds of details. A professional from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes. He admired that about her.

The payoff—the tiny moment of illumination that redeemed the time spent in surveillance, guaranteeing it was a profit instead of a loss, and that would guide his decision-making going forward—happened around ten-thirty Eastern time.

The movie was over, and the stewardesses had dimmed the cabin's overhead lights. Some passengers had already settled back to sleep, others were still arranging their pillows and blankets and squirming to get comfortable. Meanwhile Laura rose and began to make her way aft towards the restroom.

Flannery wasn't sure whether the lift of Steele's head was involuntary, or if he figured that in the cabin's semi-darkness it was safe enough to risk it. Either way his gaze traveled straight to his wife, following her across the length of the cabin. The mask slipped. The real Steele, ardent and proprietary, a little anxious, was visible.

Flannery couldn't help it: he shook his head in reproof, though Steele didn't see him do it and wouldn't have understood the significance anyway. Careful, me bucko, he told Steele silently. You'll give yourself away.

And then he thought: My God, you probably already have.

For he'd recognized the look in Steele's eye straight off. A man in love, deeply, maybe dangerously, so. He recognized it because he used to encounter it daily in his mirror when Christine was still—

Don't go there, he warned himself. Don't, by the love of all that's holy, go there.

It took him a few minutes, but he drew the pall over the treacherous memories and re-focused on his internal argument, as he'd disciplined himself so painfully month by month to do.

He'd spent barely five hours in relative proximity to Steele, and already he'd uncovered Steele's Achilles heel. Niemand was a much quicker study than he. How long had it been since Niemand had calculated that the easiest way to wreck Steele was through his wife?

What disturbed Flannery still more: what specifically had Niemand done with the knowledge?

It wasn't only past experience that hardened Flannery's conviction that it was something fearfully ugly. There was the aspect of the man seated diagonally across the aisle from him, too. Somehow Flannery got the feeling that Steele's edginess wasn't a regular fixture in the days before Niemand's advent in Steele's and Laura's life.

And wasn't that the reason Flannery was here? To fix it, if he could? To make sure whatever happened never happened again?

Yeah, that was the plan.

So he tailed the Steeles once they all arrived at London Heathrow, and watched from a distance while they visited the ladies' and men's room, respectively. They were in there so long he began to worry they'd given him the slip again. But then Laura emerged in street clothes, hair loose, face made up, and headed for baggage claim.

That was his signal to move operations to the taxi stand on the departures level. Screened by a newspaper, camouflaged by the crowd, he observed while Laura hailed a cab and climbed into it. A few minutes later Steele appeared, hearing aid and cane no longer in evidence, and did the same. From the periphery of his vision, Flannery noted that Steele's beard was now innocent of powder and that he'd pulled a flat cap low on his forehead, concealing his hair. Then Flannery maneuvered close enough to overhear the direction Steele gave the cabbie: "The Princess Augusta Hotel, Maida Vale."

Normally Flannery would've sprung instantly into pursuit. But there were a few details to take care of first, his own luggage to be wrangled into a taxi, a room in Maida Vale to book. The lag time shouldn't be a detriment; he'd catch up with the Steeles shortly, long before anyone else could, and resume his post. Tossing the newspaper into the trash, he strode back into the terminal.

The Steeles' guardian angel was on the case.

* * *

They'd come full circle, thought Laura as the plane made its final approach to London.

For wasn't this where it had all started? With Roselli duping her and Remington into chasing the phantom Eric Lindstrom overseas on a non-existent case? England was where Roselli had outlined the terms of his blackmail based on what he knew about their phony marriage, and sucked Remington into his duel-to-the-death with MI5 section chief Sterling Fitch. It was where Roselli had made the confession of his feelings that had confused her so much, and fostered a pressure to choose between him and her husband where none by rights should've existed.

That was why this trip was full circle for her and Remington, too. With the passage of time she'd gained perspective enough to think of the people they were then with compassion. How hard they'd made things for themselves, each of them scared stiff of admitting what they felt for the other in case he or she didn't reciprocate! All growth in their relationship indefinitely on hold because of the marriage of convenience they believed they were trapped in; their frustration over the perpetual postponement of their wedding night the only common ground they shared, their hopes pinned on it as the last resort for salvaging their relationship. The contrast between then and now was breathtaking.

Not that the past few days had been all moonlight and roses. True, she was speaking to Remington again, but that didn't mean friction hadn't continued to flare over his misguided attempt to take Roselli on. The biggest bout had occurred the morning of the Marathon. She'd worked hard to be calm and reasonable, but Remington was so slippery, so slow to renounce any further clandestine plotting, her patience began to fray. "Let me put it to you like this," she'd said as she tugged on a pair of sweat pants. "If you ever pull anything like that again, you won't have to worry about Roselli, or the police. I'll kill you myself."

"Danny Glover to Mel Gibson," he'd drawled. "_Lethal Weapon_, 1987."

"I'm serious, Remington." It was an assertion she'd made the night before, but apparently it needed repeating.

"I don't doubt it for a moment, my love."

"The thing that gets me is how you didn't think through the possible consequences. You were so good at it in the old days, before I met you. What happened to that guy?"

"Or perhaps I did think them through and decided it was worth the risk."

"First degree murder conviction? Life in prison?'

"Mitigating circumstances, to quote a brilliant, not to mention reliable, source."

"Who would that be?"

"You. Besides, a conviction isn't by any means a foregone conclusion. It would depend on my defense. And how good my lawyer was."

She was standing in front of the mirror over the dresser, gathering her hair into a ponytail, but she'd put down the brush and turned to him. "Where'd you hear that? Not from me."

"Murphy."

"That's another thing I'll never understand—how you roped him into this."

"Simple. We were merely looking out-"

"—for me. Do you have any idea how tired I am of hearing that? Well, it stops. Now. From here on out you're going to remember I can take care of myself, and behave accordingly."

He'd faced her squarely, not in the least repentant. In fact there was a gleam in his eye that hinted at the opposite. She understood the connotation: on the surface he would smile and nod and agree, humoring her, while mentally reserving to himself the option of doing exactly as he pleased as soon as the first opportunity presented itself.

It was fresh tinder for the firebox of her temper. "You think I'm kidding, don't you? You think, oh, we'll just let it blow over, and she'll forget all about it. Right? Am I right?"

"This habit you've adopted, Laura? Constantly assuming you know what I'm thinking? _Not_ one of the things I love about you."

"I don't care!" she'd shouted. "You've driving me crazy with this business! It isn't bad enough we've still got Roselli to contend with? Now I have to wonder where you are and what you're up to every time my back is turned?

Always a canny warrior, he'd switched tactics then, discarding his defense in favor of a charm offensive. She'd allowed him to deliver two lines of his pretty speech before she broke free of his embrace. "Oh, no, you don't. You're not romancing your way out of this one. I'm not putting up with it anymore! Either you promise that it's over once and for all, or-"

She wasn't so far gone in her tirade that she didn't realize the direction in which it was headed. She'd stanched it, aware that she was flushing red. It was the sheer pettiness of the threat she was about to make that silenced her, for it would've deserved the epithet of "low blow", and she wouldn't have followed through with it in any case.

What she'd almost said was: "Or you can forget about having a baby."

She may not have said it aloud, but Remington had seemed to catch the gist. "Or?" he'd challenged her, trailing her to the bed as she plopped down and laced up her track shoes. "Or, or, or? Or what? Eh?"

"I don't know! But I'll think of something!"

Turning away from him, she'd reached into the nightstand drawer where she kept the small box that held her good jewelry—miraculously untouched by Roselli—and pulled out the tennis bracelet Remington had given her for Christmas. He'd mentioned then that he would like to see her wear it on Marathon day. Even though she was mad enough at him to spit nails, she was prepared to honor the request.

But he'd promptly taken the bracelet out of her hand. "_What_ are you doing?" she'd demanded.

"This. I've been waiting four months for this moment." Kneeling, he'd drawn her right arm toward him and begun to fasten the bracelet around her wrist. When he was finished he stayed for a moment as he was, head bent over her hand. And then he'd looked up at her, the snapping indignation in the blue eyes softened into a twinkling mixture of laughter and tenderness. "Knock ′em dead out there today," he'd said softly, an Americanism she'd never heard him use before. Then he'd whispered a new endearment that was purely Irish: "Heart of my heart."

He'd done it. He'd succeeded in getting around her in spite of herself, at least for the moment. Damn him.

Not long afterwards, they'd met Murphy in the Eliot's lobby and driven together out to Hopkinton, the starting point of the Marathon. The weather was drizzly, chilly and wind-whipped; Laura was grateful for the layers she'd donned, two long-sleeved t-shirts, hooded sweatshirt, windbreaker and gloves. Fortunately there was no snow on ground.

Murphy had announced that he'd brainstormed a plan to prevent Roselli from molesting her while she was running, but refused to unveil it until they'd arrived in Hopkinton. Immediately he'd approached one of the uniformed patrolmen who were providing security, "Murphy Michaels, P.I., The Michaels Group, Denver." Offering his I.D. for inspection, he'd gestured towards Laura. "See that little lady over there? She's my client. There's a guy after her, a real freak, won't take no for an answer even though she's married. We're afraid he might try to grab her while she's running. Anything the Boston PD could do to watch out for him, I'd really appreciate it."

Without exhibiting any trace of suspicion the patrolman handed Murphy's license back to him. "Sure thing. Got a description of this clown?"

Actually Murphy had something better: the drawing Remington had done at that first meeting with The Michaels Group. The patrolman looked it over and nodded. "I'll radio down the line. If we see him, we'll pick him up." Touching his hand to the bill of his cap in a little salute to Laura, he'd added, "Good luck today, ma'am."

"Why didn't we think of that?" Remington murmured to Laura as they and Murphy moved off towards the registration area.

"Too risky. No license…wanted by the LAPD. Remember?"

"Ah, yes. I knew there had to be something particular."

Some of the tips Gary Danko had passed on to Laura had centered on watching the race as opposed to running in it, and they'd helped shape the day's game plan for Remington and Murphy. Realistically the idea that she'd complete the twenty-six mile course was wishful thinking at best; she hadn't trained long enough, or with the dedication that would've put the goal in reach. And she'd heard enough about the dreaded Heartbreak Hill to decide to forego it for another time. Instead she would shoot for the nineteen mile mark in Newton Center. There her guys would be waiting to celebrate her accomplishment with her.

Remington for his part was noticeably reluctant to leave her on her own. "Sure you'll be all right?"

Unlike earlier, she'd experienced no knee-jerk annoyance at the reminder that he was looking out for her. "Fine."

Together they'd checked her gear for the last time, not that there was much of it. Then he'd put his arms loosely around her and kissed her almost off-handedly, because they were in public, and they'd never lost their reticence under ordinary circumstances for displays of affection in front of other people. But he hadn't forgotten his habitual farewell: "Be careful, eh?"

She'd smiled up at him and touched quick fingertips to his lips. Next Murphy was bussing her cheek with a hearty, "Break a leg, partner." Finally he and Remington were off to the car, two former antagonists become something akin to friends, bonded in their love for her.

She was alone with her great endeavor. Which was what she'd been looking forward to all along.

The two hours and twenty-two minutes it took her to cover nineteen miles were paradoxically the longest and shortest of her life. Long because of the demands on her endurance, and the concentration she had to exert in order to continue; short because she'd operated throughout from that special place in her head where nothing could disturb or intrude. And that included the loss of the agency, Remington's doubtful future and the nagging questions about Lord Claridge's death, as well as Roselli.

By the time she made it to Newton Center, she'd reached the limits on how far she could push her body and couldn't have run another step. But that was okay. It hadn't affected the enthusiastic welcome given her by Remington and Murphy and the federation of fellow spectators along Commonwealth Avenue with whom they'd struck up a friendship, either. As soon as Remington spotted her approach, and he'd guided her to the picnic area the group had established in front of an insurance agency, there were cheers, back slaps and congratulatory handshakes for her. Best of all was the shelter of Remington's embrace and the pride she saw glowing in his eyes as he breathed in her ear, "I knew you could do it."

Someone had gallantly surrendered his lawn chair to her, and Remington and Murphy plied her with water and carbohydrates until she'd more or less recovered her strength. Much later, back in their hotel room, she and Remington had indulged in a private champagne dinner. And then he'd treated her to a massage so lavish in its attention to every part of her, and so intense in its sensuality, it had her practically purring in an orgy of relaxation and contentment.

But the following morning the mood had shifted. The old team was about to part ways. Murphy was flying to Denver, the Steeles to London, that evening.

They couldn't blame Murphy for his decision not to accompany them on the next leg of their odyssey. He'd expended so much time and energy on their behalf already; he had a family to raise and a business to run. How could they ask him to commit further to living out of a suitcase, to the arduous, sometimes tedious, work of an ongoing investigation, when they didn't know themselves how long it would take? It wouldn't have been fair to him or Sherry or the twins.

There was another reason for his return home, one that had direct bearing on the murder frame Roselli had constructed. Over the weekend Brewer and Walsh had turned up evidence that strongly suggested Roselli had personally influenced an employee at the State Licensing Bureau to furnish him with a phony license. Murphy wanted to spend a day or two on site, pulling strings among his former contacts in L.A. If he was successful in arranging face time with the authorities, Roselli's mythical version of Remington Steele might conceivably begin to unravel.

Brewer and Walsh had reported an additional nugget of good news. With no Roselli around to feed it, the furor over the rival Remington Steeles had died down. Newer, juicier scandals were distracting the fickle public. Of course the relentlessness of Lieutenant Jarvis and the LAPD would indefinitely deter Laura and Remington from setting foot in Los Angeles for the time being. But at least they had ceased to be fodder for the tabloids.

After a trip to Hamden to retrieve certain necessary articles from the Fleetwood—the agency gun was at the top of the list-the Steeles and Murphy had shared a cab to Logan International, where their flights were due to depart within an hour of one another. They'd exchanged farewells outside the domestic terminal, accompanying Murphy as far as the door. "Don't be a stranger. Come visit sometime," he said to Laura. Mock sotto voce he'd added, "You can even bring _him_ along."

"And risk another right to the jaw? Don't be absurd," Remington had scoffed, but he was smiling.

"Thank you, thank you for everything, Murph." Impulsively Laura had flung her arms around him. "I'm gonna miss you."

He'd held her close, like the old and dear friend he was. "Yeah, me, too. Take care of yourself. And…remember what I said about Steele."

"I will."

Then it was Remington's turn. The two men had shaken hands with a cordiality that could be felt as well as seen, and slapped each other's backs. Murphy had said something, his voice too low for Laura to hear; whatever it was, it evoked another smile from Remington. So she and her husband both shared a secret with their mutual friend, Laura had mused as Murphy hoisted his duffel on his shoulder and was lost to sight in the busy terminal. And maybe that was how it should be.

Full circle. They'd come to it in more ways than one.

And now she and Remington were arriving in London to launch what they hoped would be the end game against Roselli, with everything proceeding according to plan. Thanks to their cleverly faked passports—Tess Harding and Walter Burns were the identities they'd chosen—they'd handily eluded the police and FBI. Even more encouraging, there was no sign of pursuit by their enemy.

She'd requested an early check-in at their hotel, and ducked into the room just long enough to stow her luggage. From past experience she knew that their favorite London hostelry, the St. John Mayfair, was far superior, but the Princess Augusta possessed one advantage that made it more attractive: Roselli most likely wouldn't find them there. Not right off the bat, anyway.

The adrenalin generated by her incognito trip across town was beginning to wear off. Jet lag was setting in. Before it became too firmly entrenched, she ran out to a grocery she'd spotted from the taxi to pick up a few odds and ends. Today she and Remington would take it easy, letting their body clocks adjust to the time change, sleeping and eating when it suited them. Considering the task the lay ahead of them, beginning with visits tomorrow to Roderick Smithers and Catherine Beverley, they could use the respite.

As soon as she returned, Remington called out from the bathroom, "Mrs. Steele? Your immediate assistance, please."

Naked to the waist, he was liberally applying lather to the lower half of his face. "Care to do the honors?"

"You want me to shave you?"

"It's high time the beard went, don't you think?"

Even as he sat down on the toilet lid, she was still hesitating. "I don't know. I kind of like it. How it looks…how it feels…"

"Perhaps we'll have it back someday. But just now it's more expedient that I appear to be the Remington Steele everyone here remembers."

She couldn't argue with that. Painstakingly she went to work, scraping the razor bit by bit over the contours of his jaw. The scenario would've been an exact replay of the way she'd tended him during her stay here two and a half years ago, except then she was cleaning and re-bandaging a belly wound he'd incurred on the spikes of a wrought iron fence while fleeing the police. She wondered if he was remembering it, too.

Eventually she set the razor aside and lifted his chin to inspect her handiwork. "Not bad."

He agreed, running his hand over his freshly shaven jaw. "A proper job, indeed."

Already clad in his pajama bottoms, he only had to turn down the bed to enjoy the pleasure of throwing himself full length upon it. "Ah, rest for the weary," he sighed. He patted the empty space next to him. "Come here."

It was an invitation she couldn't refuse. But she deliberately delayed the gratification, his and hers, slowly shedding her clothes in exchange for the nightgown he liked best, conscious of his hungry gaze on her. When she finally joined him, he sat up and reached for her with unrestrained—but oh, so sexy—impatience.

Smilingly she evaded him, opting instead to continue spinning out the moment, pushing him back down, looking him over, drinking him in. Still long and lean, but heavier with muscle than when he was younger; the silky dark curls clustering on his broadened chest; his smooth stomach and strong thighs; the shapely, long-fingered hands: he was as beautiful as always. And she would never have her fill of him.

He was watching her a little quizzically, albeit with heavy-lidded bedroom eyes. "What?" he said.

"Do you have any idea how handsome you are?"

He shrugged. "So I've been told. Flattering words, my love. They don't mean much, unless there's trust and honesty to back them up. The bigger question is, do _you_ find me attractive?"

"At the risk of inflating your ego, I believe you know the answer to that, Mr. Steele." She bent over him at last, covering his mouth with hers.

In their weariness the love they made was slow and languid, more of a gentle dance than a rambunctious romp. There was equal joy to be had in the afterglow, lying entwined together, letting time slip by unlamented and unheeded. It was also how she learned the past was occupying as much room in Remington's thoughts as it was in hers. "Imagine how different things would've been if we'd done this last time we were here," he said.

He didn't have to explain; she knew he was referring to the night when he'd helped save her from the Whitechapel Slasher, and she'd asked him to spend the night with her. A platonic night for comfort and reassurance, not sex. "I thought about it," she admitted. "A lot."

"Did you?"

"I hadn't seen you in five months. I missed you, no matter how hard I tried to pretend I didn't. And it might have persuaded you to come home with me."

"But you never asked. Why didn't you?"

"I'm not really sure. I guess the timing-"

"—wasn't right. I suppose not." A pause as he put his hand over hers, the one that was idly caressing his chest. "I'd have come home regardless, Laura." Another pause. "I did come home."

"Yes. You did."

Somehow that seemed to say it all.

Full circle, she thought for the third time as she surrendered to the pull of sleep. It was the best possible place to be. No, even better than that, because she and Remington had made it there together.

* * *

If Roderick Smithers was a lawyer with a nasty secret, he concealed it well.

Even though the Steeles had previously met him in person—he was the lawyer who'd delivered the news of Remington's inheritance to the St. John Mayfair in May of 'eighty-seven—he greeted them coolly when they arrived at his office to keep their appointment. Their purpose was two-fold. One, to collect their share of the profits from the first year of Ashford Castle's operation as a hotel, a sum of sixty thousand pounds. Two, to test their theory about a possible Roselli plot to pass himself off as Sean James, and how much, if anything, Smithers knew about it.

They dispatched the former goal with exactly that: dispatch. "You'll have to inform the Castle staff that the arrangement you've contracted with them is invalid under the terms of the Earl's inheritance, Mr. Steele," Smithers said, sliding the envelope that contained the check across the desk to Remington.

"Really? I assumed you'd already handled that."

"I? Oh, no. It's none of my affair."

"But the letter you sent-"

"—was a response to your query, no more. Having discharged my responsibility to the new Earl, my involvement was no longer required."

It was the response of a respected, trustworthy family retainer. Maybe that was exactly what Smithers was, Laura thought. Then again, at this point she and Remington had scarcely scratched his surface veneer.

"Would it interest you to learn that my husband didn't send that letter, Mr. Smithers?" she said.

"Indeed it would. How curious."

"Naturally it follows that we've never seen it. We were wondering if you have a copy you'd be willing to show us."

"Certainly."

No reluctance that Laura could detect. And Smithers' expression remained completely unperturbed as the Steeles studied the single type-written sheet for both content and clues. The wording was formal and succinct; the envelope bore a Los Angeles postmark and Remington Steele Investigations' return address. Otherwise it offered no answers at all.

Laura laid it aside and thanked Smithers for the consideration. "Please understand, we're not motivated by some sort of morbid curiosity. And we respect the guarantee of confidentiality you owe your employers. But we need to ask some questions about the late Earl's illegitimate son, Sean James."

"You may ask. I won't promise to answer."

Time for a shift in focus: Remington picked up the conversational ball and ran with it. "What we're mainly interested in is whether other false claimants to Sean's identity have ever come forward. Besides me, I mean."

Smithers sniffed in disdain. "Unfortunately there's no shortage in the world of opportunists keen to exploit a family tragedy. Preposterous. The Earl was far too shrewd to be fooled."

"Do you remember any of them in particular?" Laura asked. "Any His Lordship found especially upsetting?"

"They were all upsetting, Mrs. Steele. Lord Claridge was a warm-hearted man. He yearned for his son. To have his hopes raised only to be continually dashed was very difficult for him." Smithers glanced at Remington. "I believe that was one reason why he was so taken with you, Mr. Steele. You accepted the truth gracefully, without a fuss. In so many respects you were the kind of young man he hoped his son had become."

The praise touched Remington deeply; Laura heard it in his sharp intake of breath. To give him space to regain his cool, she addressed Smithers. "One more question. Do you remember, in the weeks and months before the Earl died, getting the impression that he was on edge for no reason you could see? Uneasy? Even afraid?"

Smithers regarded them in silence for a moment. He folded his hands on the desk. Then he leaned forward as if to impart a confidence.

"How strange," he remarked, "that you should ask."

TO BE CONTINUED


	16. PART II:  Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Whatever you do," Laura warned Remington, "_don't_ introduce me as your current inamorata, Myrtle Groggins."

He shot her a glance as he eased their rental car to a stop at a traffic signal. "Don't be absurd, Laura. It's entirely in keeping for us to pose as lovers. Essential, really. Otherwise they'll put us in separate rooms. Forty-eight hours with no…ah…marital concourse. Are you trying to subject us to cruel and unusual punishment?"

"It's not that! It's the name! You know how much I hate it."

"Well, then, who do you want to be?"

"We've been invited as special friends of Lady Catherine, right?"

"Right."

"And you're going to be Reggie Whitewood."

"Always a useful cover. Amusing, too."

"Then I'll be Reggie's fiancée, Annabel St. George."

"Annabel St. George?" A frown furrowed Remington's brow; even in profile, Laura could tell. "I don't recall Hepburn playing a character called Annabel, let alone a St. George."

"She didn't. It's from _The Buccaneers. _Four American girls descend on nineteenth century London to be married off into the aristocracy."

"Hm. Reggie Whitewood. Annabel St. George. Reggie and Annabel. Annabel and Reggie." His test of the variations concluded, Remington gave a satisfied nod. "An inspired choice, all things considered. You've gotten very good at this."

"I'd say it was because I had an excellent teacher if I didn't think it would go straight to your head."

It was Friday afternoon, and the Steeles were en route to Arthur Draycott-Dawkins' "country place", also known as his estate in Hampshire. They'd discovered to their great good fortune that their arrival in London had coincided with the weekend of Dawkins' annual spring house party. On roughly the same date, in the company of many of the same guests, Lord Claridge had died a year ago. So it was only fitting that the Steeles had snagged an invitation to the high-toned event through the auspices of his widow, Lady Catherine.

They'd paid her a visit the previous afternoon with Roderick Smithers' revelations still fresh in their ears. Yes, the Earl had seemed terribly preoccupied, even withdrawn, over the last few months of his life, Smithers had told them. No, he hadn't confided in his solicitor as to the cause. But he _had_ altered his will—in March, to be exact—bequeathing the life interest in Ashford Castle to Remington Steele. No, the bequest hadn't struck Smithers as odd. He wasn't in the habit of questioning the Earl's decisions, and in any case had deemed the Earl's reasoning sound. Remington was the closest His Lordship would ever get to his long-lost son. Ever the circumspect counselor, Smithers had accepted the decision at face value, and left it at that.

During the cab ride to Lady Catherine's Belgravia town house, it was Laura who expressed the reservations Smithers hadn't. "So Lord Claridge spends a grand total of twenty minutes with you, and he's so bowled over, he's willing to hand over a good chunk of the Beverleys' hereditary property? I don't buy it, Mr. Steele."

"Insinuating that it wasn't my appealing personality that won him? Laura, I'm deeply hurt." On her eye roll Remington added: "Actually I don't buy it either. But jog my memory. Didn't Daniel tell you His Lordship had alluded to something along those lines?"

"The night I found the watch. You're right. They had a heart-to-heart, Daniel admitted he was your father, and the Earl left you the castle in the hopes it would bring the two of you together. I remember thinking at the time how awfully sentimental it was."

"But not altogether implausible."

"Not until now."

"Then perhaps we should hear what Lady Catherine has to say on the subject."

Shortly thereafter they arrived at the town house they both knew so well, at least from the outside. And Laura found it hard to suppress a shudder. In her mind's eye she was seeing not the weak spring sunlight and the robin's egg tint of the sky, but the lengthening shadows of a September evening. A tall, dark-coated masculine figure in a top hat, muffled to the eyes, slamming out of the front door; the slow, ominous crawl of a black brougham as its driver searched for a victim; a death struggle in a dark alley a few blocks away, her versus the Whitechapel Slasher…

Slipping her hand into her husband's and returning the squeeze he gave it chased away the residual fear. Who cared if it was a show of weakness on her part? Even strong women needed comfort and support every now and then.

Lady Catherine answered the door herself and led the Steeles into a pretty ground floor sitting room. As she poured tea for the three of them, Laura's eyes traveled to the portrait that hung over the fireplace. She recalled it vividly because she and Mildred had interrupted Her Ladyship, before she was Her Ladyship, in the midst of sitting for it. It was probably why it seemed weird to see her wearing slacks. Somehow the court dress and tiara in which she'd been painted suited her better than contemporary clothes. Otherwise she was the same dainty Dresden figurine of a woman Laura had met two Septembers prior.

But only at first glance. The longer they sat, the more painfully obvious the changes became. Catherine Beverley's green eyes were expressive of unspoken sorrow, even when she was smiling. There were lines around her eyes and mouth that shouldn't have been, given her age.

She'd dispensed with formality at the outset ("please call me Catherine"), which helped chip away some of the restraint—but not nearly enough, in Laura's opinion. After all, what did you say to a still-grieving widow whose husband had met an untimely end, likely at the hands of a killer? Where did you even start?

Gently. Compassionately. Respectfully.

With a quick glance at Remington, Laura said, "The last thing we want to do is upset you, believe me. We were so sorry to hear about your husband's death—"

"Thank you. The letter of condolence you sent was very kind."

"He was a fine man, the Earl," put in Remington. "We were glad—Mrs. Steele and I—that we had the chance to know him, if only a little."

Lady Catherine inclined her head in acknowledgement of the praise. "He felt the same way about you." There was a pause as she glanced from Remington to Laura. "But something tells me you haven't traveled all this way simply to offer your sympathy in person.

There was no use beating around the bush, Laura thought. "You're right. But it's…um…it's a bit difficult to say what we have to say…"

"Then may I say it for you? You suspect there's something not quite right about my husband's death, don't you?"

"What makes you ask?"

"Because…because there are times when I've wondered the same thing myself."

At that point Lady Catherine abruptly set down her teacup. The struggle to maintain her composure was evident in the tremble of her lips and the immovable straightness of her back—the perfect posture she'd charmingly deprecated the first time Laura met her. It wrung Laura's heart to see it. "Go on," she said.

"Are you familiar with the circumstances of James's death?"

"Killed in a riding accident during a weekend in the country," said Remington.

"That's the official story, yes."

"But you don't accept it."

"I don't know. Sometimes it seems the only possible explanation. But other times…" Trailing off for a moment, Her Ladyship suddenly burst out: "There are so many unanswered questions! Why did Bucephalus throw him—a horse he'd broken in with his own hands? James knew Bucephalus. Bucephalus knew him. Dawkie kept him for James's particular use—"

"Dawkie?" asked Laura.

"Arthur Draycott-Dawkins. He and James were lifelong friends. We were visiting him that weekend, as we often did. You probably already knew that."

"We did," Remington agreed. "But tell us, this arrangement between the Earl and Mr. Draycott-Dawkins. Rather unusual, wasn't it?"

Her Ladyship bristled, an incongruous reaction for a woman so soft-spoken and gentle. "If you're implying there was something underhanded—"

"Not at all, I assure you. But it strikes me as…unorthodox, shall we say? Were any of your mutual friends aware of it?"

"What my husband's trying to ascertain is whether there was a pattern, a routine to your visits to Mr. Draycott-Dawkins, that someone could've picked up on," added Laura. "Someone who might have wished His Lordship harm."

"You're not suggesting that one of our friends-?"

"Your Ladyship—Catherine—we've yet to discover proof there was foul play, let alone determine a suspect and a motive." This from Remington in his mildest, most soothing tone.

"And we'd like to hear the other reasons behind your suspicions," said Laura.

"Yes, of course. Forgive me." Her Ladyship sipped her tea as if hoping to draw strength from it. "Looking back, I suppose it started before the wedding—before we were engaged, even."

"And that was-?"

"In May of 1985. James seemed restless. Preoccupied—"

Restless and preoccupied. Almost the same adjectives with which Roderick Smithers had described the Earl's state of mind. At last we're getting somewhere, Laura inwardly enthused.

"—I thought perhaps it was because the reporters were already circling, trying to find evidence that he was returning to his old habits. But when I asked him, he only laughed. Let them waste their time, he said. I'm a changed man." Lady Catherine took another sip of tea. "But then the art started disappearing."

Remington was instantly on the alert. "Art."

"Nothing very large at first. Little figurines and carvings. Walking sticks. Fans. I didn't think much of it. But when a spectacular inlaid chest went missing—it stood in the hall at Sotherton as long as I'd known him—I realized something was terribly wrong."

"Did your husband explain?" Laura asked.

"Only that he'd sent them to Ashford Castle for safekeeping. But I wondered. It didn't make sense. We never visited Ireland, not once. Yet he was clearing out our London house and Sotherton, sending our treasures there."

Laura glanced at Remington again, seeking confirmation that they were more or less on the same track. Lady Catherine was right; it didn't make sense. But the very incongruity might be the first solid lead they'd come up with.

Careful to keep her voice casual, she proceeded to sound Lady Catherine out as to the existence of inventories of the three estates she knew comprised the Beverley property: the aforementioned Thames-side mansion, Sotherton Manor in northwestern Wiltshire and Aylesmere, the ancestral seat in Somerset. Would there also be a way to mark the items that had vanished from each one? Lady Catherine promised that she'd see it was done.

The final order of business was to lay their game plan out for Lady Catherine and then pose a few indirect questions about Sean James. "One of our goals is to interview as many of the guests who spent that weekend at Arthur Draycott-Dawkins' as possible," Laura began.

Her Ladyship looked alarmed. "But I thought you said they aren't suspects?"

"They aren't. But they _are_ possible witnesses. Talking to them may jog their memories, uncover a detail they missed last year."

"We'd be undercover, of course," said Remington. "Entirely for their protection. If there is a murderer out there somewhere, we want him to continue believing he's gotten away with it."

"I hate to inconvenience you, Catherine," Laura said. "But if you could see your way clear to giving us their names…making some introductions."

Lady Catherine was a long time in answering. Instead she gazed at the Steeles, a questioning, slightly troubled look. Then she seemed to resolve whatever misgivings she was having and said, "I have another suggestion. Dawkie's giving a party this weekend. The same invitation list, I expect."

Without the foggiest idea where Her Ladyship was going with this, Laura replied, "How nice."

The comment fell on deaf ears: Lady Catherine was already across the room and picking up the phone. Moments later she was saying into it, "Dawkie? Catherine Beverley here. Have you room to welcome two more guests on Friday?"

* * *

"Don't you find it odd that the Earl didn't confide in his wife about the impostors trying to pass themselves off as Sean James?" Remington asked as the cab carried the Steeles out of Belgravia.

Laura considered the question briefly. "Not really. Not when you think about it. She's much younger than he was. He probably thought he was shielding her." Before Remington could jump on that—it was an uncomfortable parallel to their own relationship—she hurried on. "It won't hamper the investigation. This art angle has definite possibilities."

"I'll be interested in having a look at those inventories when they arrive."

"Of course, Mr. Steele. You _are_ the family expert in disappearing treasures." Controversy between them averted, she flashed him a coquettish smile.

They stopped for an early dinner at a pub in St. Johns Wood, a section of London unfamiliar to Laura, one Remington had chosen because it diminished the likelihood they'd run into one of his cousins. Circumstances being what they were, the Steeles were avoiding the Chalmers family for the time being. Once they'd stopped Roselli and definitively cleared Remington's name, they could look forward to building stronger ties.

Settled in her seat, menu choice made, Laura decided it was time to quiz Remington about the weeks he'd spent alone in London in 'eighty-five. Explaining her tentative theory that Roselli might have pegged him for destruction about that time, she asked, "Do you remember any strange incidents? Someone watching you? Following you?"

He laid his fork down and leaned back his chair. "Nothing that strikes me offhand. Though I was certain at the time that someone was dogging my footsteps. The Earl's lackeys was what I thought. It turned out I was dead wrong. But I don't imagine I was thinking clearly at the time."

"It's not so easy, keeping a clear head when you're so close to finding your long-lost father."

"It wasn't that. Or, yes, it was, but only to a degree. There was…ah…another matter occupying me, you see."

He was looking somewhat embarrassed; that was why she realized he had something particular to say. Probably memories of their time here in 'eighty-five, influencing him as they had her. She tried to keep herself receptive to whatever it was.

"A wonderful young lady back in the States," he said softly. "I couldn't seem to forget her. You're not the only one who spent a miserable summer, pining for the person you loved." He studied her expression, smiling a lopsided little smile. "Ah, surprised you, have I? You always did have trouble believing our time together meant something to me."

There was no denying it; he _had_ knocked her off balance. "But…you're the one who didn't want to be with me. You're the one who packed up and left me," she stammered.

"Did I? Or was I discreetly shown the door?"

Caught without a ready reply, she could only gaze back at him.

"Think about it from my perspective for a moment," he went on. "You said you wanted time apart. Close as we'd become, you never once in three years let me make love to you. And it would've been love, Laura. Make no mistake about it."

Her first instinct was to trump him, even though she knew her defense was feeble. It sounded feeble, too. Yet she would've hated herself for not making it. "You didn't even bother to say good-bye! Five months without a note, or a call-"

"I'd jeopardized the agency, very nearly lost it-and you said, what if it's the only thing keeping us together-"

"And I came over to find you, and when I finally did, you were so blasé about seeing me, so—so-"

"-Afraid to get my hopes up. How did I know what you were doing here? That night in the alley, for example? When Inspector Lombard and his men were searching for me? It appeared you were about to betray me."

"I wouldn't have done that. Ever." The words had erupted from Laura with astonishing vehemence.

"Yes, well, I know that now, eh? But later you hired a room for me…got me a doctor…offered to take the watch to the Earl…And then you kissed me." His voice had dropped in volume, husky with emotion. "Did you never guess what that kiss said to me?"

Mutely she shook her head.

"That perhaps you did care for me. _Me_, not your stand-in for Remington Steele. That someday, if I waited long enough, it was possible I'd make you mine. Even that you'd forgiven me. God help me, I'd never have found the courage to ask."

"What about the passport?"

"The clincher, of course."

This account of his impressions, so different from the ones she'd imputed to him, had made her feel slightly dizzy. As if they belonged to someone else she noted her hands on the table, gripping each other tightly. Was she so clueless, that she could've misread him so abjectly? And what about him? How could he have mistaken her confusion over their relationship for rejection?

She gazed across at him, this man who was her husband, her beloved Remington, and recognized the effort self-disclosure was costing him, offered freely where a year ago she would've had to extract it shred by painful shred—if he gave up anything at all. And she felt the same twinge of regret she'd experienced on the plane. They'd made life so difficult for themselves, harder than it needed to be. Neither one of them entirely right; neither one of them entirely wrong. Perpetually at cross-purposes with each other.

At least they were learning. And the lessons were a hell of a lot more life-shattering than the instruction she'd given him in the art of detective work, or him exposing her to movie classics.

She paraphrased all of that for him, putting her heart into it.

He shifted reflexively into humor, just as she expected him to. "Teaching one another to love?" he'd replied. "What a novel notion. Who'd have thought it possible for people as inept at it as we once were?"

"Not inept, Mr. Steele. Novices. And getting better at it all the time."

He'd listened, spearing a bite of steak and kidney pie. Chewed it thoughtfully. And then he'd smiled.

"You know, my dearest love? I believe you may be right."

* * *

True to Lady Catherine's word, the inventories of the Beverleys' movable property were delivered to the front desk at the Princess Augusta by nine o'clock sharp the next morning. Actually there were two of them in duplicate, dated December 1984 and April 1987. Laura pounced on one set of copies, Remington the other. It didn't take long for him to formulate an opinion of what they were dealing with. "Unless I miss my guess, all these items originated from Egypt. The contents of a tomb, to be exact."

"What makes you think so?"

"The descriptions, for one thing." He read aloud from one of the pages. " 'Coptic shrine, lapis lazuli and gold, circa 1330 AD.' 'Ivory inlaid walking stick, circa 1457 AD.' Not the kind of merchandise normally available on the shelves at Harrod's, or Marks & Spencer."

Intrigued, Laura put down her sheaf of papers. "How well do you know Egyptian art, Mr. Steele?"

"Not nearly as well as I'd like to. It's been quite the mania here going on two-and-a-half centuries, expeditions to the Valley of the Kings and the vicinity. The British Museum contains the largest collection of Egyptian artifacts in the world, with the exception of Cairo."

"So how did you—the British—get your hands on the loot? Tomb raiders?"

"A misconception, Laura, no doubt propagated by all those mummy films out of Hollywood. The reality's far more prosaic. Most of the expeditions have been legitimate archeological endeavors. Sanctioned by our government and Egypt's. Completely above ground, so to speak." He allotted himself a few seconds to smirk at the bad pun. Serious again, he continued, "That's not to imply thievery doesn't exist. It does. As does a thriving black market in stolen antiquities. I can attest to it from experience."

"Cuillerier et fils?"

"And my work with Henri."

"For a man who doesn't know Egyptian art, you're doing pretty good." She fell silent for a moment, thinking over this fascinating new twist. "Let's compare these to the list of the castle's valuables I found in Roselli's files."

Working together, they spent no more than fifteen minutes tops combing through all three inventories. The end result was unambiguous. Not one of the objects had officially arrived at Ashford Castle.

Laura remained undaunted. "Okay, back up a step. What would prompt a man to hide a stash this size in the first place? And to keep it a deep, dark secret from his wife?"

"Evidence of a crime he's committed?"

"Nice. How about blackmail? Someone threatening him with exposure?"

"A someone who was cut out of his or her share, perhaps?" Now it was Remington's turn to stare into space momentarily. "Laura, what do the Claridge files have to say about the Earl and his father? Specifics, I mean?"

"Not much beyond their official biographies. The dates of consequential events in their lives. That kind of thing. James Beverley pursued a hedonistic lifestyle up until his engagement to Catherine Galt. No job of any description, not even a titular seat on some board of directors."

"And his father?"

"George was a different animal. Faithfully discharged his duty in the House of Lords. World traveler. Gentleman scholar. Primarily interested in-" Laura paused as the mental light bulb went on "—the ancient world."

It was a crucial link in the deductive chain; Laura could feel it. And it was a short step from there to the next one. "In the meantime, Roselli knows something about archeology," she said slowly. "Or claims to."

"A claim as bogus as the Irish accent he's currently sporting."

"Maybe, maybe not. Nothing he does would surprise me anymore. And it certainly fits."

Running a hand through his hair, Remington stood up and stretched. "Roselli's experience or lack thereof aside, I know just the chap who can lend a hand in this situation. Check out the local art scene and so forth."

"And that would be-?"

"Johnny Todd."

At the mention of his Cockney alter ego, Laura stifled an 'oh, no'. But her tone was stern as she said: "Do you _really_ think it's necessary? We're talking two years since the Earl started transporting these things to Ireland. That's long enough for a trail to turn ice cold."

"Worth a try, nevertheless." And Remington ambled off in the direction of the bathroom.

Naturally she couldn't talk him out of it; when he emerged from his shower, it was with his hair gelled and slicked back and Johnny's shifty-eyed leer affixed to his face. "Too-roo, luv," he said as he zipped his leather jacket over a black t-shirt and jeans. "See you in the funny papers."

Obnoxious, as his Johnny act always was. She went to kiss him good-bye anyway. "Do me a favor? Don't bring this tough-guy shtick back with you. And watch out for Roselli?"

His kiss was pure Remington even if his voice and wink weren't. "Don't worry about Johnny Todd. He can take care of hisself, he can."

"That's what I'm afraid of."

Eager to be out and doing, he'd left the task of packing for that afternoon's journey to Hamphire in her hands. Though, to give him his due, he'd departed Los Angeles well supplied with the wardrobe essentials for a weekend among the upper crest. "Have tuxedo, will travel?" she'd remarked facetiously upon discovering it in his garment bag.

"A true gentleman is prepared for every sartorial emergency, my love."

That left her with the dilemma of what to do about an evening gown. There was only one solution: she'd have to go shopping. Thank goodness for the sixty thousand pounds from Ashford Castle.

Their financial situation was uppermost in her thoughts during the cab ride to the intersection of Brompton Road and Sloane Street. Cash flow wasn't too tight, not yet. And there was still money divided between savings and investments back home. But the constant draw on their resources without revenue to balance it was beginning to be a problem. The four weeks they'd been on road was okay. They could stretch it another month, maybe two. If they hadn't resurrected the agency by then, started attracting paying clients…well, the outcome wouldn't be pretty. Mildred would have to find a new job. And she and Remington would either have to re-invent themselves, or go broke.

Unless they sold the house in Windsor Square.

The merest suggestion of it made her recoil. Sell their home? The place where they'd been transformed into Mr. and Mrs. Steele, not just in name, but hearts, bodies and minds? It didn't bear thinking of.

So she did something totally uncharacteristic of her: she deliberately ceased to think of it.

By noon she'd returned to the hotel with the spoils, as Remington would've put it. By two o'clock he was back from an errand even he had to admit was fruitless.

At a little before three they were on the southwestern-bound motorway to Hampshire.

TO BE CONTINUED


	17. PART II:  Chapter 3

**A/N: Just a note to say I've done a little revising of Part II, Chapter 1. Nothing major, just a line or two to help readers remember who Roderick Smithers is (the lawyer who appears at the beginning and end of "SWAK1" with news that Remington has inherited Ashford Castle.)**

**~MG**

Chapter 3

The Garlands was the name of Draycott-Dawkins' estate, and it was an impressive place, a red-brick, mid-Georgian mansion surrounded by swathes of grassy parkland that gradually sloped towards low hills. A trio of uniformed men was stationed at the front entrance, one to take the Steeles' car to the garages, one to usher them into the house, the third apparently to supervise his colleagues' work. The first man turned the Steeles over to a female servant who led the way upstairs.

Remington had guessed correctly: he and Laura had been assigned separate rooms, albeit with the saving grace of a connecting bathroom. But at least modern comforts buttressed the undeniable old-fashioned charm. From her past experience with English country houses Laura knew that was something to be grateful for.

According to the programme that lay on their bedside tables, they were at liberty to settle in and make themselves comfortable over the next few hours. Cocktails would be served in the winter salon starting at seven. A buffet dinner would follow in the small dining room at eight. Tonight's dress code was "casual elegance."

For Remington that translated into narrow, pleated Italian pants in charcoal gray, a white silk shirt and a pair of highly polished Gucci loafers. With a little hum of pleasure he signaled his approval of her outfit—a figure-skimming white jersey dress, belted in black-before he said: "Remember, Laura, I'm the dissolute, reprobate son of a wealthy English expat living in South Africa. An incorrigible gambler…an absolute scoundrel with women."

"And I'm the flirtatious Southern belle who's got her hooks in you. Sweet as pie on the surface, but with sharp claws underneath."

"Sharp claws, eh?

"The sharpest. A match made in heaven, wouldn't you say?"

He twinkled down at her, openly pleased by the gusto with which she'd thrown herself into the role-playing. "I've always thought so."

They'd purposely delayed their arrival in the small salon until fifteen minutes later than the designated hour, guaranteeing that the room would be full. It was. Heads turned; there was a slight lull in the conversation. Then Arthur Draycott-Dawkins, a tall, tweedy man with a brier between his teeth, detached himself from a group near the fireplace. He proved an exemplary host, pouring drinks for the Steeles, making introductions.

There were twelve couples gathered, including the Steeles and Draycott-Dawkins and his wife, Rosalind. According to the list Lady Catherine had provided, seven of the other ten had attended last year's party. The bottom line was, Laura and Remington would have to work hard to manage private conversations with fourteen potential witnesses prior to Sunday afternoon.

Dinner wasn't very conducive to the investigation, but it presented a small snag that almost blew their cover. One of the men on Lady Catherine's list was a writer named C. J. Gildersleeves; he engaged Remington from across the table. "And how do you know Lady Catherine, Mr. Whitewood? If you don't mind my asking."

"Not at all. And it's Reggie. My brother was at school with her."

Momentary silence descended on the table. "How very odd," said the woman on Draycott-Dawkins' left. "I could've sworn Catherine was at an all-girls school. L'Institut Château Beau-Cèdre in Montreux."

The slip in Remington's composure lasted no longer than an eye blink, Laura was convinced. "And so she was," he replied smoothly. "Jasper was her ski instructor. You should've seen him racing down the Matterhorn, schussing…carving…" He heaved a doleful sigh. "If only we could've dissuaded him from attempting to ski the western face of Mount Everest."

Gildersleeves looked puzzled. "But it's impossible to ski Everest's western slope."

"As my brother demonstrated, to my family's eternal sorrow."

That seemed to satisfy the company in general. As soon as no one was looking, Laura caught Remington's eye. Nice save, she mouthed.

Sometimes that irritating glibness of his came in very handy.

Conversation was light and superficial throughout the rest of dinner, which ended on a somber note. First Draycott-Dawkins made sure that every guest had a full glass of wine. Then, calling for attention, he rose and motioned them to do the same. "It would be unforgivable of me to ignore the sad anniversary I know we're all remembering. Or to overlook the empty chairs around this table. Our dear friend James…his loving wife, Catherine. So I give you"—he held his goblet aloft—"absent friends."

"Absent friends," everyone echoed him, and touched their glasses.

It was very affecting; even Laura went a little misty-eyed. But not enough to prevent her from covertly scanning the faces around her. They displayed varying degrees of sorrow, all of them. Maxwell Beverley, the current Earl, was on the verge of tears. If his cousin James had had other murderous enemies apart from Roselli, the people at this party weren't among them.

Not long afterward everyone dispersed to enjoy The Garlands' various indoor diversions. There were billiards, cards, a screening room and, most surprising of all, an American-style arcade outfitted with video games and pinball machines. Observing Remington as he sauntered towards the card room, a blonde on each arm, Laura opted for the arcade. Odds were she'd be the only woman there. And she was masquerading as a congenital flirt. Shouldn't take more than an a few minutes before she had these English gents eating out of her hand.

Sure enough, she'd barely won her first round of pinball when one of the younger men headed her way. Martin Ingram, another entry on Lady Catherine's list. "May I join you, Miss St. George?" he asked.

Ever so slightly she fluttered her lashes and then flashed her dimple. "I'd be so tickled if you would, sugar."

That encounter set the pattern for the ones that followed. By the time midnight rolled around, she'd orchestrated a tête-à-tête with four of the seven men she was targeting. With only her host, Mr. Gildersleeves, Lord Claridge to go, she was ready to call it quits.

Too bad Remington—or rather, the blonde with him—wasn't. Sabrina Ellis was her name: _not_ on the list. As Laura approached the poker table where she and Remington were obviously the last two soldiers standing, Ellis hitched her chair a little closer, slipped her arm through his, and directed a feline smile in Laura's direction.

Sizing Ellis up, Laura felt her fighting spirit heat from a simmer to a boil. Ellis was younger than she, and pretty enough in a pink-cheeked, blue-eyed English fashion. But she was no Felicia Desmond. And if Laura could triumph over a champion player like Felicia, she could definitely rout this twit with one hand tied behind her back.

So she said: "Reggie, darlin'? It's bedtime," with a sultry emphasis on _bed_.

The pour of pure honey that was her Southern accent drew a sparkle of admiration from him, just as Laura knew it would. Then he let those laughing blue eyes travel her slowly from head to toe. While his voice said, "Ah, Annabel, darling! Where have you been keeping yourself?" the eyes asked, "Come to save me from this dreadful limpet of a woman, are we? What took you so long?"

"Oh…around and about," Laura replied to his audible question. Silkily she inserted herself between him and Sabrina Ellis, wound her arm around his neck and leaned in to kiss his ear. "But now I'm missin' my Reggie."

Her "Reggie" was finding it tough to keep his cool; the giveaway was his hastily crossed legs. Laura smiled as she savored the pleasure of discomfiting him for a change. Then she asked, "And who's your little…companion, darlin'?" An extra subtle dig, because Sabrina Ellis topped her by a good five inches.

"Mrs. Ellis. She's joined me for a spot of poker." Discomfited he might've been, but Remington was enjoying the attention—and the joke—as much as Laura was.

Ellis, on the other hand, wasn't enjoying herself a bit. She hitched her chair backward an inch or two without releasing her grip on Remington's sleeve. "We were about to play our last hand," she informed Laura. "Would you like to know what the stakes are?"

"Only if you're dyin' to tell me, sugar."

"Reggie's room…or mine?"

"I see," Laura drawled. She was playing with a lock of Remington's hair, winding it around her finger the way he loved to do with hers. After letting the pause stretch out long enough to build the suspense to breaking point, she added, "And what does the winner get?"

Remington muffled a snort of laughter. Patches of red flared in Ellis' cheeks. Her eyes thinned to mere slits. Meanwhile the dealer was watching the exchange with a grin. Hoping for a cat fight, probably.

Ellis gestured to him. "Deal!" she barked. To Laura she added, "I'm sure you're capable of…restraining yourself…for a few minutes more.

"Why, no, sugar." Laura smiled at Ellis sweetly. "I don't believe I am. When I said I miss my Reggie, I meant, I _want _him. _Now_. I'm sure you can understand that? And won't stand between me and my fun? You _are _a married woman, after all. And I…am so…" By this time she was planting tender, murmuring kisses on the side of Remingon's neck. "…_Not_."

It was the romantic equivalent of a coup de grâce. Sabrina Ellis scrambled up from her seat. Remington was barely able to reach for her hand and plant a perfunctory kiss on it before she was flouncing away.

It wasn't until he and Laura were climbing the stairs with their arms around each others' waists that he asked in a low voice, "I take it that was a show of the claws?"

"Mm-hm."

The next morning they breakfasted early in the large dining room, taking advantage of its solitude to compare notes and assess their progress. They decided that while they'd enjoyed better-than- average success in initiating discussions about the Earl's death, none had yielded anything new. His Lordship's friends couldn't remember any detail that would contradict the official pronouncement of accidental death. They'd been nowhere near the site where Bucephalus had thrown him. Some of them hadn't realized he'd gone riding at all.

"Know what I'm beginning to think, Laura?" Remington said. "The only place we'll find what we're looking for is one we haven't considered yet."

"The field where the Earl's body was found."

"Precisely. And the best means of getting at the truth is recreating the ride he took."

"But then we'd have to come clean with Mr. Draycott-Dawkins."

"So we'll come clean. What's the likelihood he'll cut up rough? It's obvious how much he loved the Earl."

"You're right. I say we go for it. I wish I could talk to the new Earl first, though. And his wife."

"A wish I believe is about to be granted." Remington's comment was sotto voce; from his seat facing the door, he shot her a significant glance.

"Don't tell me. They're on their way in?"

"They'll be upon us momentarily."

And so Lord Maxwell and Lady Portia were. Unceremonious in the best sense of the word, they thumped down into chairs next to the Steeles with high-piled plates and a cheery 'good morning'. The contrast between this couple and their predecessors was striking. The James Beverleys had worn an unmistakable air of glamour, enhanced by his dark good looks and her well-bred beauty. The Maxwell Beverleys were almost their antithesis, plain-featured, graying, on the pudgy side. Yet for all that they were attractive people, probably because of their kind eyes and open smiles.

They didn't have any qualms about bringing up their late cousin, either. "I only wish I was there when the dear old boy went down," declared Lord Maxwell. "Maybe then he wouldn't have passed on. Poor Sotherton."

Laura pricked up her ears. "Sotherton? Isn't that a house?"

"Excuse me, terribly sorry. Viscount Sotherton is one of the family titles. An earl's son can use the style Lord Sotherton if he pleases while he's waiting to inherit. Sotherton…er, James…always did, even as a boy. He went in for that sort of thing."

"One of the perks, you might say," Remington remarked tongue-in-cheek.

"Well, yes. The pomp and circumstance. The power, too, I suppose, what there is of it."

"It was why he was such an excellent earl," Lady Portia chimed in. "He looked and sounded the part, didn't he. While Max and I—we're hopeless at it, as you can see."

Remington and Laura hastened to offer reassurances that, no, that was far from the case. Her Ladyship smiled, self-deprecating. "You're too sweet. But d'you know, whenever I'm addressed as 'Your Ladyship', I still look over my shoulder to see who they're talking to?"

"Never dreamt we'd inherit," said Lord Maxwell. "Sotherton was so hale and hearty, and his new wife so young. They'd have children in no time, we thought. Meanwhile we were caught up in our own interests—committee work and our travels, on safari, or some archaeological dig-"

"—Like Sotherton's father." Lady Portia had finished her husband's sentence in the way long-married couples frequently do.

The Steeles never noticed. Laura for one was thinking: Safaris. Archaeological expeditions.

_Like the late Earl's father, George Beverley, eighth duke of Claridge. _

_Whose academic interests had centered on the ancient world._

It was exciting, the speed with which the puzzle pieces were coming to light. Laura was ready to probe farther into the nuances revealed by Lord Maxwell's comment to the exclusion of everything else. But Remington refused to cooperate. Reining her in, he liked to call it. "Plenty of time for that once we're in the saddle—assuming we're allowed to ride," he said. "There's only a day and a half left of the weekend. I suggest we ask our host as soon as possible."

It was a major relief to find their more optimistic expectations of their host were right on. Not only was Draycott-Dawkins not upset that they'd concealed their identities and profession, he was pathetically grateful for their interest in his old friend. "Bucephalus is at your disposal," he told Remington. "And we have a delightful bay that'll suit your wife perfectly. I'll give the orders. And, please—if I can do anything else-anything at all-don't hesitate to ask."

"A map to the spot where the Earl was thrown should take care of it for now," Laura said.

A pair of riding pants might also have been nice, but frankly she balked at trespassing that far on Draycott-Dawkins' hospitality. Jeans, a russet turtleneck and a wool blazer would have to do for her. As for Remington, he conjured from his suitcase the jodhpurs and boots she'd last seen at a charity polo match sponsored by rival caviar companies back in 'eight-six. Another sartorial emergency, prevented! He topped them with a white oxford shirt, a tweed sport coat and his ubiquitous Ray-Bans. And then, hand-in-hand, he and Laura strolled out into the mild Hampshire air.

The "delightful bay" was a mare named Aurora; her sweet disposition had Laura completely charmed within a few minutes of the Steeles' arrival at the stable. Aurora's glossy mane and tail perfectly matched Bucephalus' coat. For he was aptly named, the quintessential black stallion, all arched neck, flared nostrils and prancing hooves. And once her husband was ensconced in the saddle, the picture he and the horse made was so perfectly balanced—so absolutely _right_—that Laura's throat tightened at the beauty of it.

Strange: though she and Remington were both fairly good riders, somehow it wasn't an activity they pursued in Los Angeles, together or apart. The novelty nudged the case into the background for a while. It was great fun to trot, and canter, and gallop with him. He dared her to jump a low fence and critiqued her technique. She challenged him to a race, and won. The horses were a dream to handle; it was easy to tell they were frequently worked in tandem.

The sniper only needed ten seconds to shatter the idyllic scene into a thousand jagged fragments.

The sequence of events was rapid-fire. Remington and Laura pulling up, laughing, in a little clearing. The crack of a gunshot. Bucephalus whinnying wildly, front legs rising and rising. Remington fighting to keep his seat, frantically manipulating the reins, terse commands and curses issuing from between his teeth. His shout as he slipped backward. The wicked thump as he hit the ground.

Flat on his back. Arms and legs splayed out.

Motionless.

It wasn't that Laura felt her heart stop. Wasn't that how people described their response to sudden catastrophe? For her it was more like someone had seized her heart in a merciless fist and stuffed it into her throat. Meanwhile her other pulses—wrists, fingertips-were drumming fast and faster. Fleetingly she wondered if Catherine Beverley had had the same reaction approximately a year ago today.

Oh, God, a voice in her head was wailing, keening, screaming. I've lost him.

Then:

"Oof!" Remington was struggling to turn from his back onto his right side. "Ouch! Bloody hell!"

Laura dismounted, and flew to him.

He relaxed gratefully against her supporting arm as she eased him into a semi-upright position. "Nice to see your smiling face, my love."

She cupped his face in her free hand and bent to kiss him. "Thank God you're all right! For a minute there? When you didn't move-?"

"Merely taking a breather." With his forefinger he traced her lips, her cheek, and then tapped her on the chest with it, imitating a gesture she'd made eight days before. "You're allowed to fuss over me to the extent I'm allowed to fuss over you, you realize. That's the new rule, eh?"

His pallor and the harsh lines that etched his mouth told her he was making light of his injuries for her benefit, both to reassure and distract her. But she was in no mood for the ridiculous. "Mr. Steele, that was a gunshot, in case you didn't notice. You could've been killed!"

"We both could. Bugger me if I don't know it already. Meanwhile whoever it is, is making a clean getaway."

That statement helped them both to focus. She laid two fingers on his lips. "Sh."

The rural peace wrapped itself around them as they listened, heads cocked. But it was ominous instead of soothing. In the woods surrounding them, leafless tree branches soughed and creaked in the breeze and unfamiliar birds called. What was missing was the crackle of underbrush signaling that their assailant was either advancing on them or beating a retreat. In that respect they heard nothing at all.

"Think he's still up there?" Remington whispered.

"I don't know." Laura was systematically scanning the banks on either side of them. "With no leaves on the trees he should be easy to spot, but—Oh, God-" She ended on a sharp intake of breath.

"What?"

Less cover, she thought. That means _he_ can see _us_ just as well as we can see him. No, better. And we must look like a couple of sitting ducks.

Then she thought: Roselli.

"We need to get out of here," she said aloud.

More easily said than done, given Remington's condition. He was coherent; that was one blessing to be thankful for. And as she started to check him over, he complained of pain in his back and limbs, not his skull. Erring on the side of caution, she ran her fingers over it, but there was no lump forming beneath the silky dark hair. He could wiggle and bend his arms and legs, too. Marvelously, miraculously, he wasn't critically injured.

But could he walk? That was the burning question. She wasn't sure how much distance they'd traveled from the stable; what if it was too far for him?

Airily he brushed her anxieties aside. "Help me up, Laura. Let me lean on you. And take it slow."

The problem was, he'd overestimated what he could handle. She got him onto his feet, all right. But a second later he was crashing down to land on all fours. "Bugger!" he gasped.

That scared her so much on top of the fear already driving her that she snapped at him when she should've been pampering him. "For God's sake, Mr. Steele! We have to _go_!"

Surprised, he peered up at her. The effort he put forth to fight through the pain was heartbreakingly apparent. "All right," he panted, using her as leverage to pull himself up again. "I'm all right."

This time he was able to stay on his feet. He even took a few halting steps, though he had to lean on her heavily to do it. It brought back swift-flying memories of extricating him from Anna Patton's garden shed in January.

They could probably make it back to the house on foot, but there was no telling how long it would take. And it might allow Roselli another shot at them. If she were to leave Remington here while she sought help, on the other hand…

As she had with Anna, she briefly entertained the idea and then dismissed it. They would stand or fall together in this situation—literally, it seemed—just like they always did. Stopping long enough to grab the horses' bridles, they limped out of the clearing.

It was a slow, awkward procession that wended its way back to The Garlands, plagued by two increasingly restive horses and one tightly wound Laura Steele. The brush with death had triggered a feeling too similar for Laura's taste to the panic Roselli had induced in her back in Twin Pines. Her nerves were shot and her patience with them. All she could think of was retreating to the comparative safety between four walls.

She really didn't notice she was hustling Remington along at a pace he tried to match, but couldn't quite manage. She chivvied him relentlessly anyway. At last he said, "Easy, Laura, easy. We're not running the Marathon here. Mind slowing down just a little?"

She scolded him again. "You're nothing but a big baby, Mr. Steele. Has anyone ever told you that?"

"You, on any number of occasions."

"Well, you always say I know you better than anyone else does."

He glanced at her with a raised eyebrow but didn't return the volley as he normally would've.

Without further incident they dropped the horses off at the stable and a few minutes later achieved the house. Fortunately no one seemed to be around but a few members of the Draycott-Dawkinses' staff. She buttonholed one of them and asked him to let his boss know that Mr. Whitewood and Miss St. George needed to see him. It wasn't until the little interchange was over that she realized she'd forgotten her phony Southern accent completely.

Great. Just great.

Remorse started to kick in while she was drawing Remington a bath.

She wasn't happy with her earlier behavior. Not to put too fine a point on it, they'd been tracked and ambushed. If Roselli had squeezed off a more accurate shot—if Remington had moved a shade closer to the left or right—she might well have returned to The Garlands a widow, as bereft as Catherine Beverley. She hadn't forgotten it for a second. Yet there she was, barking at him like a drill sergeant because his poor battered bones didn't move fast enough to please her. And all the while he'd borne his injuries with the usual grace and humor.

What a sweet, compassionate, caring wife she was.

The single redeeming feature of bathrooms in old English houses was the deep, claw-footed tubs, she thought. She filled theirs with steaming water, helped Remington undress, and supported him as he sank down, groaning. The sight of his bruises, of which there were too many, caused her to suck in her breath. The tumble he'd taken had jarred him badly; now stiffness was setting in. He would be a man in huge discomfort for the foreseeable future.

He already was a brave one.

Dipping the washcloth into the water, she lathered it up and applied it to his back, massaging, caressing. Could he somehow intuit from her touch that she hadn't meant to yell at him, that it was the anxiety talking? That getting mad at him had saved her from succumbing to the terror of almost losing him? And invested her with the momentum she needed to get them out of a tight corner? She hoped with all her heart that he could.

Maybe he was. Or at minimum he wasn't holding it against her. For he laid his head back against the rim of the tub and gazed up at her with worshipful eyes. "Ah, Laura," he sighed. "That's so good."

So are you, she wanted to say. When I'm tough on you, it isn't because I don't care. It's because I do. I'm sorry. I love you.

Instead she soaped up the cloth again, and continued to bathe him.

Arthur Draycott-Dawkins didn't drop in on them until seven o'clock, which was actually good timing, because by then Remington was long out of the tub, in his pajamas and propped in bed on a pile of pillows and bolsters. Draycott-Dawkins stopped short at the sight of him. "Mr. Steele, are you unwell?"

"Truthfully? I've had a somewhat narrow shave." Remington proceeded to synopsize the shooting. "There isn't any chance it was one of your staff, is there? Mistaking us for trespassers?"

"Or one of the guests out hunting?" put in Laura.

Draycott-Dawkins responded with an emphatic negative.

"Then odds are good it was the assailant who attacked the Earl last year, trying to warn us off the scent." Laura's vagueness was deliberate, and so was her omission of Roselli's name.

"What Mrs. Steele is saying is we don't believe there's any danger to you or the other guests. That bullet was meant for us," said Remington.

"And what will you do now?" asked Draycott-Dawkins.

"Continue our investigation," replied Laura. "We won't quit until we've gotten to the bottom of it and brought the murderer to justice. We promised Lady Catherine."

Their assurances seemed to allay their host's fears. As he turned to go, he said, "Will Mr. Steele be recovered enough for the two of you to join us downstairs for dinner and dancing?"

"Afraid not. We're sorry to have to miss it—and for any inconvenience we're causing you."

"Not at all. I'll have dinner sent up." He clasped Laura's hand. "Thank you for everything you've done for our poor James."

As soon as the door closed behind him, Laura let slip a sigh of regret. "It's too bad. I was looking forward to tonight. Especially the dancing."

Remington's right hand was fiddling with the tuner knob of the bedside radio. "Were you?"

"Bought a new dress and everything."

Something orchestral, slightly jazzy, spilled from the radio in a crescendo of strings. Remington pulled back his hand and took a moment to appraise her. "Show me."

"What, the dress?"

"Why not?"

After the day he'd had, it would've been downright perverse to refuse him. Quickly she fetched it from her suitcase and smoothed it against her, strapless black silk voile with a pouf of fabric at the left shoulder. "What do you think?"

"Not what I had in mind."

"You don't like it?"

"I meant, model it for me." He pointed his index finger downward and rotated it to demonstrate what he wanted.

"You're kidding, right? I've been outside half the day, my hair's a mess-"

"And it'll be messier still once I've finished with you." There was that leer as he impetuously sat up and reached for her.

It wasn't the smartest move he'd ever made. In the sharp yelp he gave she could hear aching bones and sore muscles protesting his abuse of them. Inch by inch he began gingerly to lower himself back to the pillows. Between breaths he gritted out: "Just…not…tonight."

"Not tonight," she agreed.

Carelessly she tossed the dress onto a chair. Then she climbed onto the bed next to her husband, positioning herself so he could lean against her instead of the pillows. He was bigger and heavier than she, but she was strong. More than capable of taking his weight, now and always.

For several minutes they lay without speaking. Then, fingers threading gently through his hair, she said: "You're not really a big baby, you know."

"I'm not?"

"Not even close. In fact…sometimes I think you're the most courageous man I've ever known."

He shifted and looked up at her and blinked, startled.

"The most courageous," she repeated. "And the most loving. You couldn't have done more today for the Earl if he really _had_ turned out to be your father."

Either Remington wanted to reply, but couldn't come up with the words, or he couldn't summon his voice. But his eyes? The gorgeous blue eyes fastened on hers were eloquent enough for twenty men, and so was the faint, bemused curve of his lips.

But she wasn't quite finished. "He would've been lucky to have you. It was his loss, the day he figured out you aren't Sean James."

She pulled him close. And over the face he'd hidden between her breasts, she smiled a satisfied if slightly tremulous smile.

She'd paid him the apology she owed him after all.

* * *

It was after six on Sunday evening when the Steeles seated themselves wearily in a rear booth in the Princess Augusta's bar.

Part of it was their own fault. Encouraged by Arthur Draycott-Dawkins' hospitality, they'd lingered abed that morning so Remington could rest up for the long drive ahead. What they'd forgotten to take into account was the stream of weekend holidaymakers who would also be heading up to London. The M3 was practically bumper-to-bumper for most of the route.

The upside of the delay was that they had plenty of leisure to discuss the case. One point they agreed on immediately was that yesterday's shooting bolstered their theory that Roselli had used explosives to spook Bucephalus last year. Draycott-Dawkins had confirmed that the stallion didn't shy at loud noises as a rule. That might mean the behavior was isolated and learned. And Laura was willing to bet her life Roselli had been the teacher.

She also had a new idea percolating. "We'll call Lady Catherine tomorrow with a report. And then I'll ask her if there's anything left of George Beverley's personal papers, and whether she has access to them."

"Excellent plan. And we're looking for-?"

"Records from any of those archaeological digs Lady Portia mentioned. Correspondence…a journal, if he kept one."

"It might be useful to examine our Earl's letters, too. If she gives us permission."

"You're right, it would. He might not have been directly involved in acquiring the Egyptian art, but it's obvious he knew something. It's just-"

"What?"

"I feel a little…weird…about asking Lady Catherine. And I can't explain why." Laura gazed soberly out the window as if the passing landscape could offer a solution.

"An invasion of his privacy," Remington supplied. "You knew him as you didn't know his father. Funny, that. But you're not alone in it."

She threw him a grateful look. "But if we find he was hiding something criminal…and then to have to tell Lady Catherine?"

Remington's hand left the gear shift to pat hers. "Always the longsighted half of our partnership. Don't borrow trouble, my love. We'll deal with it if and when the time comes."

Though he'd felt up to it on departure from Hampshire, the long hours on the road had taken their toll on Remington, and by the time they reached Maida Vale he was craving a Cognac. Cognac being unavailable—the Princess Augusta wasn't that caliber of hotel—he settled for a good, stiff whiskey. Laura told the waiter to make it two. "You should eat something," she counseled Remington as the waiter went off. "Otherwise the booze'll go straight to your head."

"Ah, if only it would, and thence to every bone in my body. With any luck it will. Incidentally, why does it feel as if I've spent the last four hours being bashed about the ring by The Brazilian Bomber?"

"It always hurts the worst the day after, you know that."

The waiter had reappeared and was arranging a bottle and two champagne flutes on the table between the Steeles. Remington turned the label towards him and after a single glance tipped it for Laura's inspection, drawing himself up sharply. "We didn't order this," he told the waiter.

"With the other gentleman's compliments, sir."

The atmosphere prickled with sudden eeriness. It was a Twilight Zone moment if ever there was one, Laura thought. Word-for-word, action-by-action, this was what had happened at L'Alouette a little short of a year ago.

The night Remington had asked her to marry him for real. A bottle of wine from Roselli. A short note, four simple lines, and the implicit threat they contained. A fruitless chase down a London street.

So had the nightmare begun.

"Which gentleman?" Remington was demanding of the waiter.

Gesturing towards the bar, the waiter withdrew. The Steeles exchanged a glance; in one concerted motion they rose to their feet.

The man at the bar who saluted them was _not_ Tony Roselli.

Not Roselli, but a solidly muscled six-footer with hazel eyes and thick, rumpled golden brown hair. Intercepting the Steeles' stare, he slid off the bar stool and came towards them.

That was when Laura realized she'd seen him before. She was positive she had. But where? And when?

Suddenly it hit her. In the same instant, he spoke.

"Mr. and Mrs. Steele? I think it's about time I introduced myself."

He stuck out his hand.

"Captain David Flannery, U.S. Army Intelligence."

TO BE CONTINUED


	18. PART II:  Chapter 4

**A/N: Meant to post this by the 20****th****; unfortunately, last week's heat wave in the Upper Midwest got in the way. In the memorable words of Laura Holt, it turned my brain to my mush! Still, if all goes well, you can look for Part II, Chapter 5 to post around the 31****st****.**

**Thank you to Vespone for the information on the difference between a bay and chestnut horse. In my mind's eye it was a bay that Laura was riding in chapter 3. I appreciate your setting me straight.**

**Thank you also to lauryn11 for the inside scoop on the way Southern women **_**really**_** talk. This born-and-bred Northerner says, Bless your heart! (I mean that in the most genuine sense possible.)**

**Chapter 3 will be tweaked a little accordingly.**

Chapter 4

"_Carolan: The Life, Times and Music of an Irish Harpist," _said Laura.

"Not that I can claim I've seen it, but it sounds about as interesting as _Heaven's Gate_," quipped Remington.

The Steeles were still standing beside their booth in the Princess Augusta's bar, the two base points of a triangle. At the third—and focal—point was David Flannery, the stranger, the unknown quantity, the man whose name had popped up at several key junctures along the road from Los Angeles to Boston. Neither Remington nor Laura had moved to take the hand he'd held out to them. But at least now they knew he was real, this former squad mate of Roselli's.

What kind of threat he posed remained to be seen, Laura thought.

Clarifying her cryptic remark, she said: "It's not a movie. It's the title of the book Captain Flannery was reading in that diner in Pennsylvania."

"Laura, are you saying he was-?" Remington exclaimed.

"Yes."

"I'm impressed that you noticed such a small detail, Mrs. Steele." Flannery's neutral expression changed into something that resembled admiration.

"I built my reputation by noticing small details." Never taking her eyes from Flannery, she gestured towards the table. "Please. Sit."

He did, on the side she'd formerly occupied, while Remington handed her into the other and then slid in next to her. Poising himself to be first on his feet should this Flannery character try any funny business, Laura knew. She also knew why he stretched his right arm along the back of the booth, not exactly an embrace, just low enough to brush her shoulders.

Flannery was growing restive under the directness of her gaze. Good. Let him sweat. "You do realize if you'd waited five minutes, we could've met outside the Eliot two Friday nights ago," she told him.

Astonishment pitched Remington's voice into its upper register. "You mean he's-?"

"—the mystery man spying on me from the street the night Roselli ransacked our room," Laura confirmed. Of Flannery she asked, "Well?"

"The timing wasn't right in Boston," he replied.

"And it is now?"

"If you're investigating the Earl of Claridge's death, it is."

Had the Steeles met one another's eyes, it would've told Flannery exactly what he wanted to know. Instead Remington asked in a measured tone, "For the sake of argument, let's say we are. What's it to do with you?"

"Several reasons. I know who the killer is. I've been tracking him on and off for more than two years. And I've spent the last five weeks busting my ass to keep him from killing you."

"In other words, you've been following us." This from Laura was a statement, not a question.

"Since Denver." Flannery's hand traveled towards his leather jacket; Remington stiffened perceptibly. Even after Flannery turned his palms outward in a gesture that said his intentions were peaceful, Remington declined to relax.

But he did lean in just as Laura did to get a better look at the object Flannery retrieved from an inside pocket. "Radio transmitter, courtesy of the Army," Flannery explained. "Once I hid one of 'em in the wheel well of your RV or your rental car? Let me put it like this. You could've run, but there was no way you could hide."

"A cliché you've no doubt had plenty of opportunity to resort to in your…business," Remington commented dryly.

"I'm a cliché kind of guy. Oh, and Mrs. Steele? If you don't mind me saying so, I've never experienced anything quite like playing chicken against an RV on a busy highway."

For the first time surprise propelled Laura past the bounds of caution. "But I thought that was—"

"—the man you call Tony Roselli? No, he didn't arrive on the scene until the night he trashed your hotel room. He's been sending surrogates to do some of the dirty work, though."

Another sortie into his pocket, and then Flannery was laying a black-and-white snapshot in the center of the table. "Cristiano Primi."

"Surrogate?" said Laura. "More like his double. This guy could pass for Roselli on a dark night."

"Or in broad daylight, depending on how well you know him. Your friend Michaels tailed Primi for a whole afternoon, thinking he was Roselli." Flannery aligned a second photo beside the first. "Eusebio Primi. He tracked you to the airport the day you left Boston."

Photo number three: "Ignazio Primi." Flannery paused; it was a deliberate tactic to command the Steeles' attention. When they looked up at him, he said quietly, "The man who almost shot Laura to death yesterday at The Garlands."

"Shot _Laura_?" Remington said sharply. "Shot me, you mean."

"It was Laura in his sights, Mr. Steele."

"How can you be so certain?"

"Because I'm the one who blew him away before he could pull the trigger. Because it's who the man we're after…call him Roselli for the moment…is. It's what he does. He likes to watch his enemies suffer." Laura could've sworn she detected sympathy in Flannery's tone.

Maybe Remington did as well, but it didn't show, not in the cool blue eyes that scrutinized Flannery narrowly. "U.S. Army Intelligence," Remington said suddenly, like someone who'd just made an important discovery. "The best men in the world for covert surveillance. They'll see you, but you'll never see them."

Flannery smiled. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"Something one of your diplomats once told me, actually. The jury's still out as far as I'm concerned."

"Then I guess I'll have to earn your trust. Because like it or not, we're on the same side."

Remington inhaled a breath, on the verge of a retort; Laura put a hand on his knee, capturing his gaze. They shared a silent interval that excluded the newcomer, one in which no words were necessary for them to reach a consensus. When they had, it was she who adopted the role of spokesman for them both.

"If you really mean that, Captain, we'd appreciate it if you told us everything you know about the man we're all after."

* * *

It started, as Laura and Mildred had discovered the previous August, in Erlangen, West Germany, in 1977.

That was when the newly promoted Lieutenant David Flannery arrived at Ferris Barracks to assume his post as liaison to a force of demolitions experts whose mission was to locate and dismantle East German booby traps before they inflicted any casualties. Tensions along the East German-West German border were high that summer; the squad was kept busy. "Back home they called it the Cold War," Flannery told the Steeles. "But it felt pretty hot to us."

Flannery's role was in Intelligence, in addition to his expertise with explosives, but he liked working with the regular Army guys, the ones who ran the risks and took the hit on the rare occasions a mission went sour. Since he'd made it his business to learn how to wield the authority of his rank without letting it turn him into an asshole, the men reciprocated his liking and respect. He could trust them to back him up in a tough situation the same way they backed up each other.

The man he didn't trust was the partner assigned to him on the Intelligence side, Ansel Niemand.

At that point in the tale Laura and Remington stole a quick look at one another. Niemand was a name she'd stumbled across during her first foray into Roselli's files back in Pico Union in September. With its mention Flannery's credibility shot up a notch or two.

Of course "Niemand" was only an alias, Flannery went on, and it sat oddly on the man to whom it belonged, considering his Italian roots were as close to the surface and obvious as Flannery's Irish ones. The funny thing was, flawless German was among the four languages Niemand had at his command. That meant he was the natural choice for deep cover assignments, figuring out where and when the East Germans were going to strike and relaying the information to the squad's commander. He was good at it. Week after week went by in which the squad racked up results, the enemy was thwarted, and Niemand and Flannery were gaining attention among the top brass.

And then catastrophe lifted a corner of the veil of mystery that hung over Niemand, revealing the first glimpse of the darkness Flannery would come to know all too well. And the trigger was—Flannery looked the Steeles smack in the eye as he said it—the real PFC Anthony Roselli.

Flannery really couldn't say why the two men hated each other; he heard rumors of a dust-up from which Niemand emerged the undignified loser, but with so much responsibility on his shoulders, Flannery never bothered to press for specifics. Nevertheless, there was no denying that the ferocity of Niemand's and Roselli's mutual dislike stood out in sharp contrast against the camaraderie the squad usually enjoyed—a camaraderie so tight, they'd made a light-hearted bet among themselves. For six months each guy would throw part of his paycheck into a kitty. If their luck held, and they continued to return from their raids unscathed, they'd receive their money back, no harm no foul. But if the unthinkable happened—if something went wrong, and lives were lost—the survivors would divide the pool equally. Though they were officers, Niemand and Flannery had both contributed in a show of solidarity with the men.

Here Remington interrupted with, "_The Phoenix_. Jeff Chandler, Jack Palance, Hammer Films, 1959. Released in the States as _Ten Seconds to Hell_."

Flannery seemed confused—par for the course for someone exposed to Remington's encyclopedic knowledge of films for the first time. "I never heard of it. Sorry."

"World War II film. A group of German POW's is recruited by the British to defuse unexploded Allied bombs in post-war Berlin. The men make a wager that they'll outlive each other and put up half their salaries, to be shared out in three months' time. In the end, only Palance and Chandler are left. Palance receives irrefutable proof that Chandler means to kill him and pocket the money. Is that what happened outside Erlangen? Or some variation of it?"

"We know about the ambush, and that Tony Roselli was killed in it," added Laura. "If you're going where I think you are with this, Niemand arranged it somehow."

A shadow passed over Flannery's face. "It took me a long time to reach that conclusion. A couple years, to be honest. There was an investigation, but they didn't find anything. Niemand even turned down his share of the pot." Flannery spread his hands. "I thought he was clean."

"What changed your mind?"

"Our paths crossed on another assignment. Only this time he wasn't Ansel Niemand."

"Don't tell me," Laura said softly. "Tony Roselli?"

"Good for you, Mrs. Steele. Got it in one."

It was the answer to the question that had puzzled the Steele agency from the outset, the conflict between the indisputable facts of Tony Roselli's death and the living, breathing man whose recruitment photograph Mildred had requested and received from the Army. Apparently upper echelons had sanctioned Niemand's appropriation of the name for use in his intelligence work, Flannery explained. Niemand had to have put forward a compelling case for taking over Roselli's identity. No one but Flannery had recognized it for what he was sure it really was: a sign of disrespect, maybe even a celebration of Roselli's death, the equivalent of a victory lap.

Shaken, sickened, Flannery forced himself to relive the tragedy at Erlangen.

Niemand might easily have had advance warning of the ambush and purposely neglected to pass the information on. Or he could've helped it along in any number of ways. He knew how to rig an explosion just as well as Flannery did. He knew about timed detonators and delayed fuses and sequencing. He knew that blocking egress from the outside would guarantee that the men trapped inside the building would die a tortured, fiery death.

Could Niemand have used that fund of knowledge to exact revenge on his enemy, Roselli? Was he the kind of man who was capable of sacrificing nineteen other lives to achieve it? Flannery had reviewed every detail of his dealings with his former partner and reached an inevitable conclusion. Yes. Absolutely. Niemand was that kind of man.

At first Flannery kept his suspicions to himself, because they seemed crazy and paranoid and he couldn't prove them. A few more years went by. It was the 'eighties by then, and Flannery was crisscrossing Western Europe to serve in various postings where his skills were especially needed. In the meantime he'd risen in the ranks. He'd gotten married. So maybe it wasn't Flanery's fault that memories of Niemand and his possible crime slowly began to fade from Flannery's personal radar.

Until he was summoned by his superior and handed a new assignment.

A new assignment and a sensitive one, Lieutenant Colonel Marquess had informed him. It concerned Flannery's former partner, the erstwhile Ansel Niemand. People who ran afoul of him were turning up dead, and not in nice ways. It might be coincidental. Marquess was inclined to suspect the opposite. It was Flannery's job to re-trace Niemand's footsteps, investigate the incidents and submit a report. And it would be up to him to apprehend Niemand if the evidence suggested Niemand was guilty.

Was it a form of divine punishment for not opening his mouth in ′seventy-eight when he should have? Flannery had ample cause to wonder. For in a closer examination of the handful of incidents Marquess turned over to him, Flannery found exactly what he was afraid he would: hints of Niemand's presence in the shadowy periphery, working for God knew who, in the service of God only knew what goal. One thing was clear, though. Niemand didn't confine himself to snuffing out his victims quietly and efficiently. He preferred to draw it out. He stalked them. He taunted them. He did harm, and worse, to their loved ones, and made sure they had to endure it. It was single-minded malevolence on a scale Flannery had never seen before or since.

Laura had been watching Flannery during that portion of his narrative, and now, as he picked up the beer he'd brought with him from the bar, she noticed a slight tremor in his hands. Was it a trick of the light that made him suddenly look so haggard? He couldn't have been more than thirty-eight or –nine, yet for a moment or two, he could've passed for twice that age. No, it wasn't the light, but something behind his eyes, floating to the surface, vanished before she could decide what to call it.

It didn't matter that she couldn't name it; she felt herself warming towards him. But was she ready to trust him?

Everything he'd told them meshed with her and Remington's experience with Roselli. His account bore the ring of authenticity, his words the echo of sincerity. He came across as straightforward and free from guile.

"So did Jack the Ripper, presumably," she could imagine Remington saying. And he was right. None of it meant Flannery was one of the good guys.

Still, good guy or not, he might be a useful ally. "So that's why you've been tailing us?" she asked him. "We're part of your assignment?"

"One of our people on the West Coast saw that press conference where Niemand claimed to be Remington Steele and recognized him. It's the first solid lead we've had on his location in almost a year."

"That doesn't explain why you're here."

"I followed a hunch, Mrs. Steele. The woman who worked for you at the detective agency? She was a little too together for someone whose employers had just dropped out of sight. That told me Niemand hadn't gotten to you yet and you were probably still alive. I decided to make sure you stay that way." He glanced at Remington. "Both of you."

Remington muttered something under his breath. "Just how long have you been at it, this quest of yours to find him?" he asked Flannery.

"Since the beginning of ′eighty-six, off and on."

"Ah, yes. So you said. Forgive me for stating the obvious, but you've not made much progress."

The criticism was blunt; Laura expected Remington to soften it by smiling. He didn't. Above the stern line of his mouth, his eyes were anything but friendly.

Flannery swallowed it without taking offense. "He's no common criminal. I think we can agree on that."

"Is that why you watched from a distance while he treated our hotel room as his personal demolition site?"

"That's what you think I was doing?"

"My wife caught you at it."

"After I busted in and beat the stuffing out of him."

"Indeed." The sneer was implied, rather than a rearrangement of Remington's features. "Got away from you, did he?"

"Jumped out the window. Hell of a thing. By the time I made it outside, he'd disappeared."

To Laura the exchange was beginning to sound less like a conversation than a hostile interrogation, at least on Remington's part. She touched his knee again. "Mr. Steele-"

He ignored her. "And you've not seen him since," he said to Flannery.

"I don't need to. We've got a handle on his movements now. And a plan in place to stop him."

"A trap of sorts."

"Taking Ignazio Primi out of the picture uncomplicates the situation. If we can just-"

"I'd prefer you spared us the details, thanks all the same." Remington stood up abruptly, jaw set, eyes harder than ever. "I'd say it was a pleasure meeting you, but honesty prevents me. Coming, Mrs. Steele?" And without a breath of a farewell to Flannery, he stalked off.

In his wake Laura and David Flannery had scrambled to their feet and were facing each other in mutual awkwardness. "Maybe we'll have a chance to talk tomorrow, if you're around," Laura said as she turned to go.

"I'm staying at the Marriott across the way. Mrs. Steele?"

"Yes?"

"Don't worry. I'll be at my post tonight as usual."

He didn't have to interpret; she knew he meant he'd be watching for Roselli and Roselli's henchmen. She nodded an acknowledgement. Then she hurried after her unmistakably, inexplicably angry husband, wondering in genuine bewilderment what the hell had just happened.

* * *

"How come you were so hard on him?" Laura asked Remington as she helped him undress for bed.

He was absorbed in the task of unbuttoning his cuffs, or pretending to be. "Hm?"

"Flannery. You were pretty hard on him downstairs. I'm wondering why."

"He's a pro. I'm sure he's survived worse abuse." Buttons undone, Remington turned his back to her and began to shrug out of his shirt.

He hadn't asked for assistance on her arrival at their room. She'd simply pitched in as a matter of course. A bare ten minutes had elapsed since he'd departed the bar, not enough by a long shot to extinguish his temper, but years of intimacy told her he was foregoing an explosion for her sake.

She appreciated the restraint. Naturally she couldn't resist the urge to test it a little. "Why don't you like him?" she repeated, peeling the sleeves away from his arms.

"Have I ever said I didn't?"

"You didn't have to. And you're avoiding the question."

"Let's just say his story is more apt to crumble than a nicely aged wedge of Stilton."

"I'm not even going to pretend to know what that means."

He was engaged in a minor struggle to maintain his balance while removing his pants. "Laura, doesn't it bother you that the man has spent almost as much time dogging our footsteps over the past five weeks as Roselli? And with a much better ratio of success?"

"He told us why." She handed Remington his pajama bottoms. "If it wasn't for him, we would've been toast by now. Where's your sense of gratitude?"

"Suspended for the foreseeable future.

At the risk of letting him believe he'd had the last word, she abandoned the subject for the moment, turned down the bed, steered him onto it, and changed into her own pajamas. At the sight of her approaching with rolled-up sleeves and a bottle of lotion, he broke into a huge grin and flipped over on his stomach without waiting to be asked. "Be gentle with me, woman."

She knelt on the mattress beside him and then leaned over to nip his bare shoulder. "That's not what you said two nights ago."

It didn't take long for her concentrated rubbing and pummeling to loosen his sore muscles, and, she thought, to soften his mood. "I still don't get why you were so mad at Flannery," she said as she continued to work out the kinks caused by yesterday's fall.

He sighed. "Back to that again?"

"'The enemy of my enemy is my friend', isn't that how the old saying goes?"

"Except in this case, our so-called friend has done us almost as much harm as our enemy."

"How do you figure?"

"He's been at this assigment since 'eighty-six, correct? Yes?"

"Yes."

"Then, Laura…if he'd done his job properly at the outset…none of this would've happened."

So that was what this was about. Such a short sentence; so much packed into it in terms of memory and emotion. Did he really want to go over that volatile ground again?

He was already moving on, thank goodness. "Not to mention the assumption we can't look out for ourselves," he said. "That's what rankles me most. Thrusting himself upon us, as if he's the hero on the white horse we've been waiting for."

An image flashed through Laura's mind: a somber Flannery gulping his beer after verbally counting up the tally of Niemand's victims. "Know something, Mr. Steele?" she said softly. "Whatever his motives for standing guard over us are, I don't think showing off is one of them. And he did save our lives yesterday."

Remington wasn't so far gone in relaxation that he couldn't respond with a snort.

"Anyway, we don't have to like him to work with him. Or get answers out of him."

"Such as?"

"The Primis, for starters. The ones who are left, Eusebio and Cristiano? Who are they, and why are they involved with Roselli—or Niemand-?"

"Call him Roselli, Laura. It's simpler."

"Then there's the Earl. How did Flannery guess we're investigating his death? Common knowledge says it was an accident. For all Flannery knew, you and I just happened to be riding in the direction of the spot where he was thrown." She hesitated. "I'd like to sound him out about Niles Helmsley and Sterling Fitch, too, get his take on things."

Remington raised his head from his crossed arms and peered up at her sidelong. "Dredge up all that business again?"

"Haven't you ever asked yourself if there was more to the story than Roselli let on?"

"Perhaps. I've a feeling it's a knot we'll never untangle. And does it really matter?"

"I suppose not. Okay, then. First things first: tomorrow morning we ask Lady Catherine about George Beverley's papers." She ran her hands down his back in a final, sweeping motion. "How does that feel?"

Really his gusty, contented sigh was the only answer she needed. But to it he added: "I've said it before, my love. You truly are an angel of mercy."

He was still waxing fond and poetic when she returned from washing her hands and got into bed, snuggling into the curve of his body. "What would I do without you? Eh?" he whispered.

"I don't know. Turn to a life of crime? Die of boredom?"

"Loneliness, more like. And since I _am_ feeling remarkably fit-" he was stroking the hair off her neck "—thanks to your skillful ministrations-" he was nuzzling her nape "—we could…you know…"

"Mr. Steele?"

"Hm?"

She pulled his hand to her mouth, lingeringly kissed its palm, and used it to tug his arm around her. "Good night."

With a sound in his throat expressive of extreme disappointment, he subsided.

They didn't realize it then, of course. But their current run of peaceful nights together was rapidly drawing to a close.

* * *

In his room at the Marriott Hotel across the street and down the block from the Princess Augusta, the phone rang just as Flannery was about to head out into the night.

The delay provoked a stab of impatience in him. However, given that he was to all intents and purposes on duty twenty-four hours a day until the current crisis was over, he had no choice but to pick up the receiver. In hindsight he would be glad he did.

The news was promising. According to the caller, Lieutenant Frye, Niemand had just been spotted in Dublin. Frye was catching a flight to London from there; Flannery set a rendezvous with him for the following evening, one in which they would finalize details of the trap they were about to prepare in private, where no listening ear could possibly get wind of their plans.

And then it was out into the cold and darkness for Flannery, to the vantage point he'd discovered at the head of the covered walkway between two shops, the one that had enabled him to pick up Ignazio Primi's scent early Friday morning, pursue Primi into Hampshire, and prevent him from adding one more civilian casualty to the list Flannery perpetually carried around in his head.

At street level, the quiet of a Sunday night reigned unbroken. It made Flannery stand straighter, the knowledge that that thanks to him, they were lying safe in their hotel room: little Mrs. Steele, as whip-smart as he'd expected her to be, and her prickly, pride-bound husband. No question the guy had given him attitude; Flannery had expected that, too. Steele resented the implication that he needed help looking after his wife. Hands off, boyo, or I'll be breaking them, was the not-so-subtle message conveyed by that flinty gaze, the truculent jaw.

Sure, he was fierce partial to the lass, he was. Flannery chuckled inwardly. He'd have to remember to say that to Steele in his thickest brogue next time he saw him.

Because despite Steele's natural suspicions, Flannery was no rival for his wife's affections. Laura Steele was a pretty girl. Flannery had keen admiration for what he'd seen of her cool, uncluttered intelligence. But to lose your heart, it had to be available, and Flannery's—well, his wasn't, and wouldn't be ever again, this side of heaven.

What he lived for now was his oath. His desire to serve others. The satisfaction of completing a difficult mission.

And, oh, yes: his memories. How could he have left those out?

The need to drag his sleeve across his watering eyes took him by surprise. Christine, he thought. Christine.

On nights like tonight, it was just as well that he was a soldier.

TO BE CONTINUED


	19. PART II:  Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Monday morning, and breakfast wasn't even over, but the Steeles had already hit a snag in their plan to search for clues to Egyptian treasure in George Beverley's private correspondence.

"She says she can't let us have his letters," Laura announced to Remington as she ended her phone call to Lady Catherine.

He glanced up from the slice of room-service toast he was buttering. "Can't? Or won't?"

"Can't. They've been organized, cataloged and put under lock and key in the muniment room at Sotherton Manor. What's a muniment room?"

"Storage for important papers—deeds, charters, family records, etcetera."

Laura hitched a chair closer to the little table the waiter had wheeled into the empty space next to the bed. "We'd have to submit a formal request in writing to Roderick Smithers, or she could do it for us. It might take a week to get approval, maybe two. Incidentally, did you know the house is open to the public even when the family's not in residence?"

"Is it?"

"Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, eleven til four."

"Hm." Remington munched toast with a roguish gleam in his eye. "It appears that unless you'd prefer to hang about here cooling our heels for the next seven days, a side trip to Wiltshire is in order."

"You've read my mind, Mr. Steele." And she dimpled at him as she sipped her coffee, not as disappointed as she ordinarily would've been by a day's postponement in solving the case.

She reflected on the anomaly later while combing nearby shops for a few items they would need for tomorrow's excursion, leaving Remington to surf the TV channels and bemoan the Princess Augusta's lack of AMC. Honestly she couldn't remember when she'd felt quite this relaxed about the jeopardy they were in. For too many weeks in a row anxiety had ridden her hard. It was only on rare occasions, mostly in bed with Remington, that she'd enjoyed the luxury of forgetfulness. By comparison the sudden slackening of the pressure made her almost giddy.

You didn't have to be a genius _or_ a detective to connect the dots to David Flannery's arrival in their lives.

And how strange was that? It wasn't as if her impressions of him had undergone an overnight transformation—nor, for that matter, had her ingrained instinct towards caution. If anything her wariness had deepened. He was U.S. Army, which meant his authority in any investigation superseded hers and Remington's. Flannery would be well within his rights if he chose to order them to back off and let him handle Roselli. She hated the idea of surrendering their fate into his hands with a fierce, unalloyed hatred.

Yet at the same time there was a certain amount of comfort in the knowledge they were no longer fighting alone. Other people recognized who Roselli was and what he was capable of, people with power, people with resources. He couldn't wipe her and Remington off the map as easily as he might have just two days ago. At minimum they would finally be able to prove he wasn't Remington Steele.

That positive line of thought reminded her how long it was since they'd spoken to Murphy. As soon as she returned to the hotel and the time difference allowed, she called him at The Michaels Group. "God, it's good to hear your voice," he said by way of greeting. "How's it going over there?"

"Aside from Mr. Steele falling from the same horse that threw Lord Claridge? Just ducky."

Murphy guffawed. "Tell him I said guys from Kentucky don't get knocked out of the saddle. They have to pry the reins from our cold, dead hands."

"I'll meet him on any polo field he cares to name for a chukker or two. We'll see then who's the better horseman," was Remington's response to the message, delivered with the peculiar grin he always reserved for sparring with Murphy.

That little interchange behind him, Murphy got down to business. "Seriously, Laura, he's okay, isn't he?"

"Better than we have a right to hope for, considering who was gunning for us." She gave him a full rundown of what had transpired over the weekend, and then returned to Flannery's revelations concerning Cristiano and Eusebio Primi. "Could you run a check on them? Right now we don't have anything but their names."

Murphy promised to see what he could do before changing the subject. "Do you remember Rob Gracin? District attorney's office? I used to shoot hoops with him."

"Vaguely."

"He's on staff with the state attorney general now. Laura, they're getting ready to move on corruption charges against the investigative licensing board. Specifically a guy named Harold Blumenthal. He's the one who issued Roselli the fraudulent license in the name Remington Steele."

"Your guys found proof that Roselli bribed him." And you pulled strings with Gracin, just like you promised, she added silently, knowing that modest Murphy would prefer her not to say it aloud.

"It didn't take much persuasion on Roselli's side. Blumenthal already had a grudge against Steele. Something about a friend of his who yanked your license in 'eighty-five? Steele roughed him up and got him fired. Sound familiar?"

Laura opened her mouth to speak; nothing came out. Not only did the scenario sound familiar, she wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry at the irony that it formed one of the main building blocks of Roselli's convoluted frame-up. A member of the cabal of political kingmakers that had hired her three years ago to perform a background check on William Westfield had sicked the licensing board on her when she got too close to a dirty secret he was keeping. Unaware of his treachery, she'd pinned the blame on Steele and Steele's antics. And like a row of dominos set to collapse, the first misunderstanding had led to a second, the second to a third, and on and on until it culminated in Steele packing up his belongings and decamping without a word.

How had Roselli gotten wind of the incident? It was easy to guess. Everything was laid out in black and white in the case file. The most painful period of her life was what she'd called it not long ago. Would its aftershocks never end?

Meanwhile: "Laura? You okay?" Murphy was saying. "Look, I wouldn't have told you, except it sounds like things could be wrapping on your end, now that this Flannery's in the picture. I just wanted you to know it's a matter of weeks. The indictment's already been sent to the grand jury. Rob says there's no question they'll find probable cause to try Blumenthal." Murphy hesitated. "Maybe it's time you and Steele started thinking about coming home."

The gasp escaped her before she could stifle it. Instantly it drew Remington's eyes to her. And it kept them on her during the remaining minutes it took to finish the conversation and disconnect from the call.

By then he was sitting straight as a die, the movie that had him spellbound forgotten. "Laura?"

The edge in his voice was due more to consternation than irritation, she thought. For the first time she noticed she was shaking; she clenched her hands together in her lap. "Murphy says-" She faltered. "Murphy says it's over. They found the guy Roselli bribed at the licensing bureau. And maybe we can…we can…come home."

She didn't start to cry, not really. But there was no question her composure cracked, along with the mental walls she'd built to contain the memory of everything she and Remington had lost. No, everything that Roselli had ripped from them. Now they rushed out of that tightly locked place inside her, irresistible images conjured by the mention of home: work and Mildred and the agency; sun-drenched Los Angeles, its surf and sand eons away from the dreary northern climates she and Remington had been exiled to; Frances and Donald and the kids; the Rabbit and the Auburn and the house at Windsor Square where she and her husband had lived their happy married life. So powerful was the onslaught, she covered her face with her hands to shut it out.

Even so she had a distinct sense of how swiftly Remington moved. Between one pulse beat and the next he was with her on the side of the bed and had his arms around her. "Hey," he whispered. "Hey."

Of course she reverted to type, insisting she was all right. Lucky for her he'd learned over the months of their marriage to ignore that kind of stupidity. Was there anything more heartening in the world than resting against his strength, basking in his musky, masculine warmth, the Irish music of his voice awkwardly murmuring comfort to her, the gentleness of the large, long-fingered hand smoothing her hair? If there was, she neither wanted nor needed it. This man who loved her was her shelter, and entirely sufficient.

Gradually she regained control and could look him in the eye again. It wasn't until she did that he said with the faint air of command she didn't deplore quite as much as she pretended to: "Let's take a walk, eh?"

On her feet and in motion, she found she could think rationally about Murphy's news. Talking about it was another story; she had to work her way up to that by degrees. Remington seemed to understand, and refrained from pressing her to get to the point.

Leaving the shops and hotels behind, they turned eventually into a block lined on both sides with tall, old-fashioned apartment buildings. Somehow, despite its undeniable Englishness, it was homier and less stodgy than the areas where Remington's cousins lived. Totally unlike Windsor Square, too, and yet… "This is an interesting part of London," she remarked.

"Like it, do you?"

"Very much. Don't you?"

"It has its good days." His tone was the one he generally used when dropping a tantalizing tidbit about his past.

"You mean you've lived here."

"Nine months in 'sixty-eight. Or was it 'sixty-nine? It was one of our flush times, Daniel's and mine."

"Do you remember where? Would you take me there?"

He did remember, and conducted her to the street, which wasn't far away. But while she exclaimed at the charm of the four-story Victorian building ("they're called mansion flats, Laura") with its wrought iron balconies and back garden, he stood quiet, hands in pockets, plainly indulging her. It wasn't that he was protecting himself from an excess of inconvenient emotion. The sight evoked no emotion in him, period—except maybe indifference.

She taxed him with his lack of enthusiasm as they resumed their walk. "You're not the tiniest bit wistful? Not a teensy-weensy smidgen of nostalgia for the old days?"

"Just another in a long line of roofs I've lived under. It didn't do to get attached, not in my case, anyway. You, on the other hand..." He looked down at her reproachfully. "I'd no idea you wanted to go home so badly. Why didn't you tell me?"

She'd recovered enough by then to tell him the sober truth. "I didn't know it either, until I talked to Murphy."

"And he thinks it's possible?"

"More than that." Quickly she filled him in on Harold Blumenthal. "Do you realize what that means? The truth about Remington Steele doesn't have to come out. No one will ever have to know I invented him."

"We still have a hell of a lot of explaining to do if you mean us to pick up where we left off in Los Angeles."

"I know. We'll have Stacie Adamski handle that. Look how fast she got us back on track last year." Laura was referring to the publicist they'd hired the previous September to rehabilitate the Steele brand following Roselli's break-in at the agency.

"Yes, but that's only half the problem. There's what Jarvis knows about me…and whoever was working with Windsor at Spotlight News. Somehow I get the feeling that all the good press in the world won't keep them from spilling the beans."

"They'd have to prove it, though."

"Then there's the fact that we ran, instead of standing our ground and defending ourselves-"

"With good reason!"

"You and I know that. But the appearance of the thing, that's what counts."

She frowned. It was a truism in their relationship that she was the grounded, practical one, he the dreamer, the gambler. Of course there'd been a few examples of role reversal over the years, say, her fervent if scatter-shot campaign to clear her idol, "Atomic Man", and his actor alter-ego from a murder charge. Remington had had enormous fun at her expense, punching holes in her theories, even threatening her with shock therapy when she got herself arrested.

He wasn't laughing now. That was what sent her hopes plummeting. If he, the man who always managed to manufacture a fresh start out of the direst failures, considered it a lost cause, what did that bode for their prospects? Their future?

"Are you saying we can't go back?" she asked him.

"Not necessarily. But we may not be able to turn back the clock, no matter how hard we try. Perhaps if we started at the bottom with new names, and built another agency…or adopted a new profession entirely…" When she didn't reply, he moved a step ahead of her and stooped a little to peer into her face again. "You suggested it yourself, remember? Something less risky, so we can have a baby."

Him and his memory: you couldn't put anything past it. Still, though they were her words, that wasn't her vision. Hell, no. What she wanted was a triumphant retirement on her terms, fêted and regretted by the citizens of her birthplace, acknowledgment from her peers that she was the best of the best, and an open door for her to take up the mantle of private investigator again one day if she chose to.

Not slinking back in anonymity to become a cog in the machinery of some mid-grade detective shop.

And honestly? Who would hire her and Remington now? They were tarnished goods. Even if she could bring herself to apply to Havenhurst, the guy who'd taken over after Alan Grievey died would probably laugh in her and Remington's faces, and dine out on the story for weeks afterwards.

Just under two months ago, when she and Remington had discussed their first tentative plans for parenthood, it was with the underlying assumption that they'd raise their child in L.A. Was that dream forfeit, too?

There was a bench up ahead; she sank down on it. Out here in public burying her head in her hands would normally have seemed too dramatic a gesture of distress, but she couldn't help it. As he had in their hotel room, Remington sat next to her, patient, waiting.

And then he said with the Irish audible once more: "Are you not able to be happy living anywhere else, Laura?"

She lifted her head to look at him. If there was a difference in their temperaments that was almost—not quite-beyond bridging, this was it. That they thrived equally on excitement and adventure with a twist of danger was a given. But to do and be her best, she had to have a stable home base to which to retreat from the fray. She needed her house and her things and the city where she'd grown up. From the moment she'd met Remington she'd realized the perspective was foreign to him, and little had changed, despite the pains he took to understand her.

With all her heart she yearned to tell him yes, she could, she could be happy anywhere as long as they were together, as he'd so often assured her. But the lie stuck in her throat. "I don't know."

He was taking her hand; he was patting it and closing it between both of his. She laid her head against his shoulder. After a long time, during which they did nothing much but watch passersby, he said, "Well, then, we'll have to find a way to go back, won't we, my love?"

"If only we could. But what if we can't?"

"Then we'll make one."

* * *

The solution they hit upon was simple, elegant, and, best of all, basically required them to continue what they were doing. Find evidence that Roselli had murdered the Earl of Claridge; turn it and him over to law enforcement, proving on the international stage their mettle and worth as investigators. There was a catch, though.

They had to beat Flannery and the Army to it.

"It should be a piece of cake," Laura declared. Her spirits had rebounded amazingly over the space of a few hours, which wasn't unusual when a clear goal replaced amorphous fears. "We're more than halfway there already. All we have to do is get Flannery off our tail, and then-" She snapped her fingers and dusted off her hands as if their watchdog were already a distant memory.

"And how do you propose we do that?" demanded Remington. "A man who's tracked us not only across an entire continent, but an ocean as well? And never once lost us?"

"It's not like he used instinct, or good old shoe leather." A note of disdain crept into Laura's voice. "He had technology to help him. Once we take away his advantage…"

"Yes, of course, the radio transmitter! Without it he's flying blind. Well done, Mrs. Steele. Well done, indeed."

"I'll distract him, you'll search our car for the offending equipment. I trust you'll deposit it in an…interesting…spot afterward, Mr. Steele."

"The possibilities boggle the mind."

So at five forty-five, and on Laura's initiative, she and Flannery were again sitting down to cocktails in the Princess Augusta's bar.

Or rather, she ordered a Scotch and soda. Like the previous night, Flannery stuck to a single bottle of Harp's, and nursed it throughout the conversation. To be so abstemious well out of range of his superiors' scrutiny seemed to Laura a sign of his devotion to duty; she had to admire both it and his self-restraint.

She'd purposely neglected to tell Flannery over the phone that Remington wouldn't be present. "Mr. Steele's not joining us?" he asked, taking a quick read of their surroundings.

"We went for a walk earlier. He's a little tired." Always a firm believer in the up-front approach, she held Flannery's gaze. "He'd also prefer to steer clear of you."

He ducked his head as if he were embarrassed. "I know. It's too bad. I really am harmless."

"Harmless is one thing, Captain. Trustworthy is another. And that's what my worries my husband."

"If he's not convinced by now…"

"Conviction has nothing to do with it. I only wish it did."

There she paused and glanced away from him. She'd come into this meeting fully prepared to give Flannery an earful on Remington's behalf, but it wasn't as much to point fingers as a tactic to knock Flannery off balance. The pressure of defending himself would allow him fewer opportunities to speculate on Remington's absence, was her reasoning. Now, faced with Flannery in the flesh, she wished she'd bitten her tongue. Maybe it was the kindness in his hazel eyes that shamed her. Or it could've been the memory of the bleakness she'd glimpsed in them the previous night.

Her discomfort must've been apparent to him, for he said, "Go ahead, Mrs. Steele. Whatever it is, you can say it."

"My husband says—he thinks-" Damn it, Laura thought; this really was harder than she'd expected. "Roselli—Niemand—has done some terrible things to us. Remington thinks it's partly your fault."

A stricken moment, and then Flannery stared down into his beer and let silence fall. He didn't seem inclined to break it anytime soon. In fact, Laura received the uneasy impression he'd forgotten she was there.

Impulsively she slid her hand across the table, where it stopped just shy of touching his. "I'm sorry."

"What?" Aghast, he met her eyes. "No, no, _I'm_ the one who should be apologizing. To defend and protect, that's a soldier's mission. At least that's how I think of it. Mr. Steele's right. The buck stops with me."

"In my opinion, it's awfully negligent of the Army to lay the responsibility for catching Niemand on one man's shoulders."

Flannery looked more put out by that criticism than he had by any of the comments she'd made about him personally. "Not when you consider what a sensitive situation it is. Ever heard the expression 'gone rogue'?"

"Only in the movies."

"Trust me, this is real life. Can you imagine the uproar if these countries found out an American soldier—an _officer_-is on an international killing spree? My God."

"So your job is to reel him in with as little fanfare as possible. What happens after? A court martial?"

"Quick and quiet. And then he goes to prison for a long, long time."

A jail term, even a life term in Leavenworth, didn't strike Laura as a punishment commensurate with Roselli's crimes; as the old saying went, hanging would've been too good for him. She made a mental note to avoid sharing the information with Remington if she could manage it. "I appreciate your candor, Captain," she said.

"It's nothing. Forget it." He was turning a pretzel over and over in his fingers but making no move to eat it. "Mrs. Steele? Can I ask—if you don't mind talking about it-? The terrible things Niemand did?"

"Besides stealing our identity and our business?"

"Knowing him, that's just the tip of the iceberg."

Laura nodded. "He spent months sneaking into our office, combing through our files…transforming himself into a credible Remington Steele. I went in earlier than usual one day and caught him. He got a little…violent. It was no big deal, a concussion, I've been through worse. But my husband? He…didn't handle it well."

"I don't blame him. Not many men could stand for something like that." Flannery's voice was very low. "Not if they're real men."

"You sound like you're speaking from experience."

"I am."

It was one of the most nakedly honest admissions Laura had ever heard from another person, let alone a virtual stranger. Did it also hold the key to his personality? In their two encounters thus far she'd judged him to be quiet and self-contained, and taken it for granted as the natural by-product of his military training. Could it be that a different force entirely was at work here? A personal tragedy, maybe?

If so, what role if any had Roselli played in it?

Her curiosity well beyond stimulated, she was gearing up to explore those questions along with the others she'd planned to pose, Roselli's real name, for example, and why Flannery suspected that he'd killed the Earl of Claridge. But Flannery was rising from his seat. "I'm sorry to cut this short, but I have to take a phone call in ten minutes."

"Oh." Absurd disappointment gripped her, not all of it attributable to the loss of a potential gold mine of information. "Okay. Thanks for coming over, and for an interesting conversation."

"You're welcome. It's on me." Before she could stop him he laid a few pound notes on the table. "We'll talk again." With a final, tentative smile, he turned and walked away.

She watched his departing figure until it disappeared from view. No, Captain, she said to him silently. We won't. Not if Remington and I have anything to say about it.

It was surprising how much she found to regret in that thought.

* * *

The Steeles were last in line for Tuesday morning's guided tour of Sotherton Manor, the Beverleys' home in Wiltshire, behind one busload of American senior citizens and another of English schoolchildren.

That was fine; ideal, in fact. They were grateful for the cover. The more tourists there were, the better the chances they'd be unremarked by guides or guards when they discreetly excused themselves to reconnoiter the muniment room.

They'd made a stealthy departure from Maida Vale a little after sunrise, not because it was an arduous drive—it took them slightly over two hours—but to buy some time for accessing the manor's grounds unobserved. In the trunk of the car was their luggage, thanks to one of the Princess Augusta's off-duty porters. Remington had bribed him to carry it down to their car as soon as he'd ended his shift and changed into his street clothes. Just a precaution, Remington had explained to Laura, in case Flannery was seized by a sudden notion to stake out the entrance to the hotel's garage.

Remington had disposed of Flannery's radio transmitter with similar cleverness—and, it had to be confessed, more than a touch of mischief. "Hid it on a tour bus leaving for Northumberland," was his reply when she asked about the transmitter's whereabouts. "They should be well out of Bedfordshire by now."

"Is Northumberland far from Wiltshire?"

"Let me put it like this. Any farther north, and Flannery'll be in Scotland, wandering among the 'Birks of Aberfeldy'." And Remington had whistled a snatch of an unfamiliar tune, a wickedly gleeful spark in his eye.

Laura couldn't deny it was funny…but it was also a little sad. Flannery was to all appearances a good man, earnest, eager to help. It wasn't his fault it was in the Steeles' best interests to mislead him. Especially since northwestern Wiltshire wasn't a destination for them, but a stopover. Once they'd wrestled what clues they could from George Beverley's correspondence, the Steeles would be winging their way to Ireland and Ashford Castle.

It was fairly early when they left Malmesbury and its ancient abbey behind and turned onto the narrow rural route that led to Sotherton. Through her research Laura had learned that the once-thriving town had dwindled since the 'thirties into a bedroom community that consisted of fifty or so houses, a church, grocery and post office. Likewise the manor that had dominated it had become a curiosity, almost an afterthought, no longer central to the townspeople's lives.

But it was still a jewel-box of a house, built of Cotswold stone and nestled into a green fold of countryside. Less grand than the Steeles had pictured; more isolated. Hiding the car in a sheltered grove just up the road, they assumed a brand new backpack apiece along with their identities as wide-eyed American tourists and hiked to the manor's perimeter.

If there were security guards around, Remington and Laura saw no sign of them. A small, easily dismantled gate afforded an entrance to the rear gardens. There Remington set about sketching a diagram of the house's exterior with doors and windows prominently marked. Rough as it was, it also managed to be in perfect scale. Laura was suitably impressed.

Now what they needed was a good look at the interior. And who better to provide it than Dora Fanning, the pink-faced, round-bodied tour guide and caretaker, Sotherton born and bred like her mum and dad before her, and her grandparents before them, and on and on, all the way back to Aldhelm, the first abbot of Malmesbury? Listening to Mrs. Fanning air her credentials as she shepherded the group of kids and retirees into the main hall, Remington and Laura had to stifle a mutual smile. It wasn't often they got the answers to nagging questions handed to them on the proverbial silver platter. This looked like one of those times.

They were right. Mrs. Fanning commented on the need for round-the-clock security (there wasn't) and confided where she and her husband lived (in the lodge just inside the manor grounds). That meant the house would be empty between roughly four-thirty that afternoon until ten-thirty the following day. Plenty of time for a leisurely breaking and entering and a thorough read-through of the relevant files.

It was the layout of the muniment room that presented the sole puzzle. Located on the ground flour, it boasted a series of narrow, many-paned casement windows that would be almost impossible to breach from the outside. Laura heard the hiss of Remington's breath between his teeth, evidence of his frustration. A nudge in Laura's side with his elbow as soon as Mrs. Fanning's back was turned, and he was melting away from the tour group. His raised eyebrow directed Laura to follow.

Their progress through the unfamiliar corridors was swift and noiseless except for Laura's whisper. "What are we looking for?"

"A way in that won't require too much finesse." He turned a knob on the left side of the hall: casement windows again. "Hurry, before she misses us."

He didn't have to say it twice. Dividing the hall between them, they opened and closed doors in concert until they found what they were looking for in a tiny powder room which had probably been carved out within the last twenty years. A simple sash window had taken the place of an elaborate mullioned casement.

They'd made the discovery just in time. As Remington whipped out his sketch and noted the placement of the powder room, Mrs. Fanning's indignant voice reverberated from the other side of the manor. "Young people? Young American people? It's terribly naughty of you to stray from the group!"

Remington gestured frantically. By the time Mrs. Fanning hove into view, even redder of face and perspiring, he was hovering over a seated Laura, fanning her in unintentional irony with the sheet of paper. "My wife," he said to Mrs. Fanning in his best American accent. "She's expecting. I guess all this walking's too much for her." And he smirked almost imperceptibly at Laura's indignant glare.

Immediately Mrs. Fanning was overflowing with sympathy. "Poor little thing. Would a cup of tea set you up? You wait right here while I make one—I won't be a moment."

"Thank you, really, I'm fine." Detaching herself from her husband's supporting hand, Laura got to her feet. "I'd like to finish the tour, if you don't mind."

"You know best," Mrs. Fanning said doubtfully. "But do be careful on the stairs."

Laura waited until the tour guide had advanced a safe distance away before frowning even more deeply at Remington. "I hope that little scenario isn't a harbinger of things to come, Mr. Steele."

"Don't be absurd, Laura. Merely a spur-of-the-moment invention."

Seven hours later, as the purple shades of twilight darkened to ink-blue, the Steeles stole once more onto the manor grounds, arriving unnoticed and unmolested. Remington jimmied their chosen window and boosted Laura through; she trained the flashlight on him as he crawled inside. Smooth, professional and in total synch with one another, just like always.

The muniment room wasn't even locked. Remington couldn't get over his astonishment. "Abysmal lack of security. What the devil was Daniel thinking, taking on the director's job? Or Lord Claridge, for hiring him?"

"But Daniel never was the Earl's chief of security," Laura reminded him. "Remember? It was all a ploy so he could see you one last time."

"Of course it was. How could I have forgotten?"

It was a good thing there was no need to waste time picking locks, for sifting through Sotherton Manor's archives, even superficially, was a monumental task in itself. It took until almost midnight to locate the section of cabinets that pertained to the twentieth century. George Beverley's papers resided in a couple of lower drawers, divided by decade into leather-bound folders fastened with strings.

Laura separated them into two piles and handed one to Remington. By the light of their flashlights they settled down to read.

And found it hard going. The eighth Earl of Claridge had been both an academic and an antiquarian with varied, esoteric interests. The folders were bursting with drafts and final versions of papers he'd published. His letters consisted chiefly of exchanges with other scholars, museums and universities. There was very little that was personal, and nothing that wasn't dry as dust.

Remington was first to succumb to the tedium. Floundering in the middle of a dissertation on translating New Testament Apocrypha, Laura was interrupted by a gentle snore. Sure enough, there he was, slumped on the floor, flashlight rolling away from his open hand.

She prodded him with the toe of her shoe and shined her flashlight in his face. "Mr. Steele! What do you think you're doing?"

He barely stirred. "Eh? Resting my eyes, that's all. Just…resting…"

That was the most she could get out of him. It was either carry on without him, or write off the trip as fruitless. Being who she was, she opted to persevere.

At a little past three in the morning she had her reward: a document different from the others. The files she'd appropriated for herself comprised the final four decades of Beverley's life; she'd worked backward from the 'sixties to the 'thirties at the bottom of the stack. What she found halfway through was a list of donors and participants of an Egyptian expedition, along with a proposed itinerary and possible sites for excavation, dated 1931.

One of the names on the list shocked her into sitting up straight. She re-read it, scarcely believing what she was seeing. And then she woke Remington.

He, too, had to peer at the paper twice before the truth sank in. Neither of them was in any hurry to say it aloud. When they did, it was in unison.

"Claudio Malatesta."

TO BE CONTINUED


	20. PART II: Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"It can't be," said Remington. Even by the diffused beam of the flashlight, Laura could see he'd blanched. "It's too much of a coincidence."

"Maybe. On the other hand, you know my theory of coincidences. They're-"

"—related occurrences whose connection hasn't yet surfaced," he completed the sentence for her, and then shook his head, unwilling—or afraid?-to concede she could be on to something. "There must be hundreds of Malatestas in Italy—thousands-"

"True, but how many of them are what it says here, a partner in the family import-export business? A shipping company that's a front for a smuggling operation. Isn't that what you told me when you were trying to talk me out of going to Pramagiorre to look for Ava Rivaro?"

Though he didn't say anything, and his expression conveyed more than a hint of skepticism, he did wait for her to continue.

"Your friends from Toulouse were cutting into Malatesta territory. So the head of the family, Tiberio, decided to send a message by killing them one by one. I believe 'hideous example' and 'unspeakable slaughter' were two of the phrases you used to describe what happened the night he found them in San Remo."

"Yes, all right, perhaps it's the same family. But if you're implying what I assume you are—that it has some bearing on the Earl's death-"

"Well, let's talk it out for a minute. Why assume it doesn't?"

"Because it's been over fifty years, Laura. If there was a score to settle, believe me, the Malatesta I knew would've taken care of it long before now."

"He could've tried and failed, and keeps trying until he succeeds. That's what they're like, you said. People from his part of Italy don't give up. They're implacable when they're out for revenge. They watch each other's backs, and hunt in packs-" Breaking off, she stared into space, replaying her own words in her head. "The Primis," she said slowly. "And…Roselli."

"Part of the Malatesta 'pack'?"

"You have to admit he fits the profile. For all we know, Malatesta could be his real last name. And if the Primis are related to him…"

Remington did something uncharacteristic: he actually shuddered. "Laura, I don't like where you're headed with this."

"Neither do I, frankly." Setting the files aside, she pulled her knees in towards her chest and rested her chin on them. "But it does explain a few things."

"Why he wants Ashford Castle."

"And why he's been so ruthless in going after it. This isn't just about Egyptian artifacts. He might be looking for revenge, or at least to restore the family honor. It wouldn't by any chance also be the reason-"

"—for his vendetta against me? Because I was with Olivier and the others that night in San Remo?"

She nodded.

"I don't see how. I'd swear nobody else knew I was there. And don't forget, it wasn't as if I dropped out of sight afterwards. Tiberio Malatesta could've hunted me down on the Riviera any time over the next five years."

Still somewhat in the dark as she was about the fine details of Remington's former life, she had to take his assertion on faith; clearly he was her sole authority as far as the bad guys who'd populated it were concerned. Besides, she was more interested in the light this new piece of information shed on facts they'd already unearthed. "This is all beginning to make sense," she said.

"In what respect?"

"Roselli attempting to masquerade as Sean James. If he's out to avenge a wronged family member, how better than by infiltrating his enemy's family? Weakening it, or completely destroying it from the inside? This could be big, Mr. Steele. Huge. Way beyond nailing Jürgen Eitschl." Her voice began to waver. "It could be our ticket home."

Unlike yesterday, she didn't lose her cool. Not that it would've bothered him if she had. She glimpsed the same understanding in his eyes as he said, "Aren't we getting ahead of ourselves a bit? We don't know yet how George Beverley and Claudio Malatesta were connected, or if the 1931 expedition even came off."

"You're right. I have a feeling we won't find the answers to those questions here, though."

"Then where do you suggest we look?"

"The place where James Beverly hid the loot, of course."

"Ashford Castle?"

"Ashford Castle."

* * *

Thus the Steeles' return to Ireland, and the real starting point of their marriage.

They were a different couple now in several important particulars, so it was only fitting that the circumstances of this arrival almost a year later should differ, too. While Terence O'Malley was waiting again to pick them up in the castle limo, a silver Rolls Royce, it was at Dublin Airport, not Dublin Port. They rode side-by-side in the sinfully comfortable rear seat, but without the traveling companions who'd put a crimp in their togetherness last time: beloved but impossible-to-banish Mildred and Roselli in his guise as romantic spoiler. This time there was no double row of servants ranged on either side of the front walk to welcome the Steeles to the castle. But in the main entrance hall-cum-reception lobby was Mikeline O'Flynn, formerly the Beverley family's butler, major-domo and head factotum, now manager of hotel operations for what was known in the trade as The Ashford.

He seized Remington's hand, pumped it heartily and bowed in Laura's direction, cherubic face wreathed in a smile. "′'Tis a rare pleasure to see you and your Ladyship, Your Lordship, it is indeed."

"It's a pleasure to be seen, Mikeline, a pleasure to be seen." Remington's nod encompassed the bustle around them, guests arriving or departing or headed for lunch in the dining room, porters shuttling baggage hither and yon, the line at the concierge's desk. "Business is booming, I take it."

"Like fleas on a dog in summer, if you'll pardon the expression. And the season's scarce begun! We none of us can believe our good fortune, Your Lordship. It's in your debt we are for signing the castle over to us, and no mistake."

"Ah, yes. About that. I'd like to have a chat, if you can spare a moment. Apparently there's been a misunderstanding over the terms of the late Earl's will. It's nothing that can't be worked out-" And slinging an arm about the other man's shoulders, speaking low and confidential, Remington steered Mikeline towards a quiet corner.

Laura had no problem being relegated to a position outside the loop; in fact she preferred to let Remington handle the vicissitudes of their life interest in the castle, their share in the hotel's profits, and the ownership arrangement with the former servants. It gave her the opportunity to poke around and refresh her impressions of her surroundings. Ashford Castle was after all the setting for a rapid-fire series of ups-and-downs in her relationship with Remington, heartbreaking lows interspersed with incredible highs. On balance it held more good memories for her than bad. How much had it altered since the servants had seen her and Remington off to London last May?

The answer to the question was, not much. Whoever had undertaken the interior renovations had had the sense to leave the fundamentals alone, designing tasteful accoutrements of the hospitality industry to integrate with them. In the high-ceilinged, white-columned entrance hall that meant black lacquer counters, desks and tables. Matching sofas and chairs upholstered in deep crimson or charcoal gray were arranged in artful groupings on the shining expanse of black-and-white marble floor. Inspecting the elegant space more closely, Laura thought she glimpsed some familiar faces from her previous visit, going about their tasks. She could've sworn the slender blonde concierge in the tailored suit was erstwhile parlor maid Bridget O'Leary. And wasn't that Finnbarr the gardener heading up the team behind the reception counter?

Amused, she continued to explore. The dining room had been expanded and scores of round tables had displaced the baronial rectangle of polished mahogany she remembered. The capacious library seemed to have been preserved for its original purpose. She knew it was crazy, but as she turned the knob to the door of the sitting room where Remington had swept her up in his arms preparatory to carrying her upstairs to make love, she held her breath; it came out in a long sigh at the visual confirmation the room was unchanged.

It was then that she felt a hand cup her elbow from behind. "Ready, Mrs. Steele?" Remington said. "Mikeline's waiting to show us to our quarters."

Wherever their "quarters" were, it required the estate car parked on The Ashford's long ribbon of driveway to reach them. Laura glanced quizzically from Mikeline to her husband. "What's going on?"

"Something of a surprise, courtesy of Mikeline. Don't worry, it's okay."

It was better than okay: it was wonderful. That was because a short drive across the grounds led to an outbuilding that had been transformed into the prettiest little guest house imaginable. To all appearances a cramped stone dwelling on the outside, it was light and airy, yet cozy, on the inside, with its abundance of new windows and cunning miniature fireplace.

"It's ours, Laura," Remington said softly. He'd hung back to allow her to precede him inside and was lingering on the doorsill. "They had it built in our honor, Mikeline and the others. It'll be open to other guests in future, of course, unless we want it. But we're the first to use it."

She took another step and then revolved in place, exclaiming in delight. The house was so small she could practically see the entire layout from her current vantage point. It was obvious the plank floor was newly laid; someone had painted it a lovely shade of ivory to pull in as much light as possible. There was a living room, a bedroom with a loft above it, open to the roof, and even a tiny kitchen whose sleek, cast-iron range nevertheless looked equal to brewing a cup of coffee or tea and producing a decent breakfast. The furniture was simple and clean-lined, the colors of upholstery and linens bright and fresh. She loved it.

But when she turned to thank Mikeline, he wouldn't let her finish. " 'Tis little enough, ma'am, in consideration for what you and His Lordship have done for us. You've set Glen Creagh on the road to prosperity, so you have. You'll see it for yourselves when next you're there." For a moment his chin quivered, but then he gestured expansively, as if shooing away the impulse towards sentimentality. "You've your own wee boiler, if it's a hot bath you're wanting. You've only to stoke the Rayburn. Runs on peat, it does. There's a kettle in the kitchen…and new bedsheets in the airing cupboard…" Still cataloging the little house's amenities, exhorting the Steeles to ring him at The Ashford if they needed anything, Mikeline eventually bowed and beamed his way out.

As soon as he'd gone, Laura wagged her finger at her husband in mock severity. "All right, Mr. Steele. Give. You were in on this all along, weren't you?"

His attempt to look clueless was a sorry one, belied by the laugher in his eyes. "Laura, are you accusing me of conspiracy? Collusion? Undertaking clandestine arrangements behind your back?"

"It wouldn't be the first time. Knowing you, it won't be the last."

There was a funny quirk about his mouth as he acknowledged she was right. "Perhaps I had an inkling of what they were about," he added. "But it was tiny. Barely visible to the naked eye."

"How tiny?"

With his right forefinger and thumb held aloft he approximated a quarter inch's worth of distance.

"I can live with that," she said, and got up on tiptoe to kiss him.

To her mind their priorities were unpacking and hurrying back to the castle to hunt for Egyptian treasure on the sly, not necessarily in that order. Evidently he didn't share her urgency. "You've not slept in over twenty-hours," he said, propelling her towards the bedroom. "We'll have a bit of a lie-down, eh? If the treasure's here, it'll keep til later."

She had to give him his due: this was one of those situations when he knew what she needed better than she did herself. The proof was the sudden wave of fatigue that washed over her as she stretched out on her side of the bed. Mentally she wasn't quite ready to raise the white flag, though. "I'm not sure this is such a good idea."

He'd settled his length at the end of the bed and was gathering her feet into his lap. "We're in Ireland, Laura. It's perfectly acceptable to flout the Protestant work ethic for an afternoon."

"But I hate to waste a minute sleeping when we're so close to solving the mystery." As if contradicting herself, she yawned.

"Don't think of it as wasting time." Her shoes and socks were on the floor by now; rhythmically, masterfully, he began to knead her right instep, just above her toes. "Think of it as re-charging our batteries. Girding our loins. Invigorating ourselves for the fray."

It was happening again, she thought: barely a few hours in his homeland and already its vowels and cadences were filtering more consistently into his speech, like a lacing of Bailey's through a mug of coffee. The sound reminded her of their honeymoon, the scary, wonderful, magical part after Daniel's death, when Remington had summoned up the courage to tell her the truth about his past. It was also increasing her drowsiness. "Don't stop," she sighed, and was uncertain whether she meant the soothing motion of his hands or his brogue's caress on her ears.

Oh, he had no intention whatsoever of stopping—she could see it in his smile. "It's not so wrong, is it?" he mused. "Taking time for ourselves? A few moments snatched from the very maw of danger, so to speak? Memories they can't erase, Roselli and his henchmen, no matter what they've in store for us tomorrow. Hm?"

"Uh-huh." The reply escaped her on another long exhalation.

Slowly drifting into slumber, that's what she was doing, borne on his low murmur, which was itself becoming indistinct. Her sense of time was growing fuzzy, too. At some point the mattress dipped as he shifted position. How soon afterward was he leaning down and pressing his lips to hers? She didn't know. His hair was like silk beneath her fingertips, so she must've curved her hand around the back of his head, and let it rest there while his mouth moved to her collarbone and then to a spot between her breasts. His whispered, "Sweet dreams, lovely love," was the last thing she heard before oblivion descended.

When she woke up five hours later, it was with well-being restored on all fronts. The little house was pleasantly warm; a lamp in the sitting room held the gathering dusk at bay. Aside from the indentation his head had left in the pillow to her right, Remington was nowhere to be seen.

There was a note for her on the bathroom sink, however, weighted down by a bottle of his aftershave. Short and stilted—he was a man of myriad talents, but letter-writing wasn't one of them—it informed her she should be ready by seven for the hotel car to pick her up, that they wouldn't be returning to the guest house that night, and not to worry, he'd taken care of everything. The signature was a single scrawled initial: _**R**_.

So he had some romantic project afoot. She ought to have known. In comparison her own proposed agenda for the evening, phoning Murphy for an update on the Primis, grilling Mikeline as to the frequency of George Beverley's visits to the castle, checking the library for isolated remnants of his correspondence, searching out the artifacts James Beverley had shipped over from London, Wiltshire and Surrey, faded into insignificance. It would keep for a few hours, as Remington had said.

But the butterflies in her stomach wouldn't. Short as the ride to The Ashford was, it had her chafing with impatience for the resolution of this new mystery. A little expert sleuthing had already revealed that her smallest suitcase, the one she used for toiletries and underclothes, was missing from the guest house, along with Remington's shaving kit and garment bag. What on earth was he up to? she wondered. She couldn't imagine.

Nor could she read it in his face. Naturally it gave nothing away as he strolled over with hands in pockets to intercept her just inside the hotel entrance. Then again, she decided, maybe there was a promise of sensual delights to come in the hooded blue eyes traveling her from head to toe. That had to be the reason for the scrutiny, and not her outfit, which consisted of a long-sleeved sweater and jeans similar to his. With his right hand in its usual position at the small of her back he led her through the archway that divided the reception hall from the foot of the main staircase.

_That_ staircase. The one he'd carried her up last May.

Excitement was fluttering inside her more intensely than ever. She stole a glance at him, thinking she'd find in his eyes the heat of shared memory, and saw he wasn't focused on her at all. In fact he gave her arm what seemed be a preoccupied squeeze and said, "Wait here." Puzzled, but appreciative of the opportunity to ogle him in her turn—how could she resist checking out what she so badly wanted to run her hands over?-she watched him climb the stairs two at a time.

It wasn't long before he was back. The weird thing was, he advanced only as far as the landing above her. And there he stood, gazing down at her, his expression expectant.

Her investigator's brain needed just a few seconds to piece the clues together. His stance. The look on his face. His penchant for re-creating memorable moments so they could savor them again.

She snapped a quick glance through the archway at the employees and guests in the reception hall. She hesitated. Remington lifted an eyebrow, both an encouragement and a challenge.

It was then that she tossed caution and inhibition to the winds without another thought. "What the hell," she said, and ran laughing up the stairs to be scooped into her husband's arms.

The smattering of applause and whoops of mirth that issued from below were embarrassing, but Remington's smile made it worthwhile. "Don't mind them," he said as she hid her blush briefly against his shoulder. "They're green with envy, I suspect."

He'd turned with her and started the ascent to the second floor. Traversing the route in person again—it had figured in her dreams more than once since that momentous night—she sighed happily. "You really had me going for a minute there, you know. I was afraid you were turning into a typical guy."

"Whatever gave you that idea?"

"Here. This. What came after. I thought you'd forgotten all about it."

"Ah. That's what a typical guy would do, is it? Forget the high points of his married life?"

"Basically? Yes."

"Am I disappointed in you. I thought we'd established long ago that I'm an original."

She laughed and nuzzled his throat. The year before, unaccustomed to this position, she'd been a little uncomfortable with it, hadn't learned yet what to do with her hands or where exactly to place her head. Now she was perfectly content to wrap her arms around Remington's neck and let him cradle her. What a difference twelve months had made!

He was pursuing their conversation without the slightest hint he was winded, despite the swiftness with which he was moving down the familiar corridor. And he was studying her in that way he did on occasion, the smile lurking at the corners of his mouth, but his earnestness unmistakable. "Did you honestly think I wouldn't remember?" he asked. "The most beautiful sight I'd seen in my life? You, headed up the stairs to me with that look in your eye, the one that meant no more bloody obstacles between us and the bedroom door, not if you had any say in the matter. There was only one thing that could outshine it."

"What was that?"

"Seeing you naked for the first time."

His voice was very soft. Meanwhile the door to the master bedroom was coming up on their right. Their destination? She assumed so. He'd left the door ajar, and the crimson glow of reflected firelight played on the hallway's whitewashed plaster. They might've been completely alone in the castle, it was so quiet.

The room had changed little from their last stay: richly furnished, stately, the potential for chilliness intensified by its vast proportions. But Remington had nipped the possibility in the bud by starting a blaze in each of the twin fireplaces at either end of the room. Candles flickered, masses of them, from the mantelshelves and tables and tops of the cabinetry.

She smiled up at him as he nudged the door shut. "You've been busy."

"Conspiring, colluding and making clandestine arrangements," he agreed. "There's more."

He carried her as far as the bathroom doorway and kissed her lightly before he put her down. And then with his arms folded around her, chin resting on the top of her head, he stood while she took in the romantic scene he'd set. The marble vanity adorned with more candles and a dozen red roses in a silver vase; two flutes of champagne sitting on a table at the foot of the big, claw-footed tub, along with the uncorked bottle. In the tub itself, bubbles and a handful or two of rose petals floated on the surface of steaming water.

"It's not long til our anniversary," he explained. "But who knows what we'll be doing on the actual day? It was too good to pass up, the chance to celebrate here, where our marriage truly began."

So he thought of it the same way she did. Why should that surprise her? Her acquaintance with the depths he hid from all but a trusted few was long and exceptionally close. Still, this fresh evidence of how much that night really did mean to him could almost have provoked her to tears—tears she would've let him see—if they weren't a couple whose ingrained response to strong emotion more often than not consisted of deflecting it into banter.

Instead she tried to communicate it with her eyes and touch as she turned and pressed him to her. "Come here, Mr. Steele. And let me make it up to you for doubting for one second that you're an original."

He loved that, and loved the kiss she drew him into, surrendering himself with closed eyes to the tender interplay of lips and tongue. When her hands began to wander purposefully over his back to his hips and then down to his rear, a sound that was half moan, half sigh, not quite her name, escaped him. In his unguarded face she read pure bliss.

What an incredible rush it was to know it was _she_ who gave him that degree of joy.

The beauty of it was, she'd hardly begun! Shifting in his embrace, she waited until the blue eyes were fixed on her again. "And now, how would you like to see me naked?" she teased. Even as he framed his reply, she was taking his hands and guiding them to the hem of her sweater, a tacit invitation for him to do the honors and undress her.

If there was anytime the contrast between last year and this showed more clearly, it was then—then, in that most private of moments, making ready to love one another. On a wave of nostalgia she pictured herself and Remington as they were that first night: a few feet of distance between them while they shed their clothes, not shy, not exactly, for they'd been indulging in the preliminaries to sex for a long time, but with so much undiscovered territory yet to navigate, understandably nervous. Their initial clumsiness as they fumbled towards what he facetiously called "the magical moment". Herself, seething with questions which, if she recalled correctly, composed a variation on a single theme. Does he think I'm pretty? Can I make him happy? If I admit I love him, will he run screaming into the night?

And now, tonight…this. This ease, this sense of rightness and completion. Part of it was experience, she thought, knowing his physical self inside out, the same way he knew hers. The rest of it was…well, maybe it was beyond her ability to describe or name. Affection, desire, safety, an amalgam of those three: that was the closest, but didn't quite cut the mustard. Probably the answer was to keep it simple.

He was her Remington. And she loved him more than anything in the world.

It didn't get much simpler than that.

In the bathtub she leaned back against him, between his bent legs, while he bathed her with the same passionate concentration with which she'd tended him after his fall from Bucephalus ("because turnabout's fair play, Laura.") Whether sampled from the glass, the bottle or the warmth of each other's mouths, the champagne was crisp and heady. Rose petals proved their usefulness for tickling him behind the ear, beneath his chin, and for stimulating other, lower regions to such good effect that he turned her swiftly to him, helped her to straddle him, and was inside her in a single quick motion. Water sloshed against the tub's high sides in tempo with their movements and spattered on the floor again and again.

Later there was dinner in front of the fireplace in the sitting area, an excellent one, for upon the retirement of the castle's dour old cook The Ashford had hired a Cordon Bleu-trained chef. Even later, gasping and throbbing in the throes of exquisite pleasure, Laura was dimly aware that her cries were ringing in the cavernous room, echoing against the walls and ceiling, until Remington stopped her mouth with a kiss. He clasped her tight and rolled over with her; secure in the strong arms of her husband and lover, gradually she came back to herself, renewed in the conviction that whatever sacrifices she'd made for his sake since Windsor Thomas's murder—yes, their home in Los Angeles included-they were negligible in the sum total of her life. She didn't regret them. Not when she had him. Not when they had this.

At length he released her and stretched on his side facing her. Exhausted he definitely had to be, but his hands never stilled, not for a moment, as if he couldn't bear not to caress her. With a forefinger he wiped away the beads of perspiration at her hairline, tucked a stray tress behind her ear, traced a circle around the pulse in her throat. "I can see your heartbeat here," he said. "And it's hammering away."

"You seem to have that effect on me, in case you haven't noticed."

"Transported you to the heights, have I?"

"In more ways than one."

Likely there was no compliment that could've pleased him more. He moved closer and rested his head on her chest, just beneath her left breast. Mystified, she demanded: "Now what are you doing?"

"Listening."

"To what?"

"Your heart, obviously."

She brushed tousled, sweat-dampened hair from his brow. "Any reason in particular?"

"It speaks a language all its own."

Making love had stirred that Celtic fancy of his, as it sometimes could. Ordinarily she remained mute while he ran on—charmed, it went without saying, but conscious of her personal deficiencies in that department. Tonight she did her best to try and follow. "And what is it saying to you, Mr. Steele?"

He was quiet for a moment. "That all things considered, I've made you happy this year."

"You have. You have. All things considered."

"And you love me."

"More than you'll ever know."

"If you had it to do over, you'd marry me again." By now he was gazing up at her. Far from meditative or melancholy, he wore the sparkle of mischief that became him so well.

"In a New York minute."

"Tuna boat and all?"

"Tuna boat and all."

"And someday…when the time's right, when you're ready…you'll have our child."

There was another pause. If this evening had been his anniversary gift to her, albeit an early one, then she had received it empty-handed. It was impossible to reciprocate. She had nothing to give him in return.

Except this thing…this one thing. The thing he wanted so badly, and for which he'd exercised more forbearance and patience, more generosity and understanding, than she would've believed him capable of. Through some mysterious alchemy, or perhaps the strength of her love for him, he'd brought her to want it, too.

Really, was it such a difficult promise to make? To all intents and purposes she'd done it already, if only to herself. Wasn't it time he had something definite to cling to? Some ground of certainty in the midst of chaos?

In the end it was, as she'd realized earlier, so simple. All she did was to take his hand and say: "I will. I promise. We will." Then, simultaneously dazzled by the brilliance of his smile, and humbled by the unadulterated happiness in it, she bent over him and sealed her oath with a kiss.

What a difference a year had made. Quarrels mended. Misunderstandings forgiven. Hurdles cleared. Demons faced and vanquished.

Nothing would ever seriously divide them again.

TO BE CONTINUED


	21. PART II:  Chapter 7

Chapter 7

The Primis—Ignazio, Cristiano and Eusebio—were Italian nationals and brothers, according to Sam DeLisle, Murphy's researcher and analyst. Current residence: unknown. Current occupation: unknown. Birthplace: Fontanigorda in the province of Genova, Liguria.

With the telephone's handset cradled between her cheek and shoulder, Laura jotted the information down in her neat, rapid script. "Give me their father's name again, Murph," she said. "And their mother's maiden name…? Got it. We'll let you know if it pans out…Thanks…I will...You, too."

"Well?" Remington asked as she hung up and joined him on the sofa in the guest house's sitting room. "Any connection between the Primis and Malatesa?"

"Beyond the fact they were raised in a Ligurian town and their parents still live there? Nothing. No family ties on their father's side. Their mother's maiden name is Giardina." She sighed. "Another dead end. I guess it's one of those days."

She sounded deflated, Remington thought, if not downright dejected. Fleetingly her tone revived memories of Twin Pines after their world had first fallen apart. She could hardly be blamed for feeling less than optimistic just now, though. Not when they'd spent the last seven hours in the castle library, combing shelf by shelf through the collection for George Beverley's name plate. With a quarter of the stacks still to search, they'd found near on two hundred books so marked. None of them remotely resembled a private journal in which the eighth Earl of Claridge might've recorded details of a 1931 expedition to Egypt.

And to think the morning had started so auspiciously! He, Remington, had arranged a final surprise to cap their impromptu anniversary celebration: breakfast in bed complete with strawberries at the peak of ripeness. Imported, and they'd cost the earth, but he'd comforted himself with the rationalizations that one's first anniversary only happened once, and his wife was worth every penny and more besides. What a fine time they'd had, feeding each other the fruit, using its juice in creative ways to stir passion to fever pitch. He'd emerged from her embrace a thoroughly sated and satisfied man.

She'd satisfied another of his passions, too. At four a.m. he'd awakened with such a powerful urge to capture her likeness in this worthiest of settings, he'd immediately jumped out of bed, thrown his jeans on and run the entire distance to the guest house to retrieve his sketchbook. After their bath she'd posed for half an hour, until restlessness overcame her, too obvious to be ignored. Their hiatus from real life had gone on long enough for her. She was champing at the bit to return to the case. A trifle disappointed but unsurprised, he'd laid the drawing aside to be finished at a more opportune time.

Now he did his best to rally her. "It was long odds from the start, eh? The idea that George would've stored private records out in the relative open, where anyone might've stumbled across them? And don't forget, we've yet to tackle the private study. He spent a good deal of time in it whenever he visited, according to Mikeline."

"Mikeline also said it's been off limits to the staff since James Beverley's death by order of Roderick Smithers, and he's not sure why, and anyone caught disturbing it is liable to be prosecuted."

"When has that ever stopped us before? As soon as all's quiet at the hotel tonight, we'll make our move."

And they did, at close to one in the morning. Slipping from their hiding place in the most shadowy corner of the library, they stole along the silent corridor that led to the east wing. This was a part of the castle with which they were less familiar, so they'd allotted extra time to locate the room that once served as James Beverley's personal sanctuary, and his father's before him. The upside was, it was tucked away on the third floor, some distance from the nearest guest rooms.

As always, the stout lock was no match for Remington's dexterity with the pick. Paneled in dark wood, its windows swathed in heavy, floor-length crimson damask, the study was stuffy and lightless as a cave. It seemed safe to turn on a couple of lamps, one on the ponderous mahogany desk, the second on a table between the windows. They illuminated bookcases ranged along three walls, a tall secretary, and a couple of low, glass-fronted cabinets. All were crammed full of written material of one kind or another.

Much of which resembled what he and Laura had found in Sotherton Manor's muniment room, Remington thought as they got to work. During this search, however, he managed to keep awake. Two hours in his concentration paid off in the first major discovery of the night. Extracting a file from a drawer in the secretary, he exclaimed, "Laura, have a look at this."

She crossed from the desk to peer around him. "What is it?"

"Contracts, invoices and work orders for the construction of an additional room here, at the castle. No blueprints, though. Damn."

"What do you think it means?"

"Nothing, unless you take the furnishings into account. Over a score of custom-built display cases, specially constructed to protect against damp and cold." He passed several sheets to her. "Notice the signature? And the date?"

Quickly she leafed through the papers. "Sotherton. The courtesy title designated to the heir to the earldom. Maxwell Beverley said his cousin James was a stickler for using it. These were signed in 'fifty-one, so it has to be him." She glanced up. "A treasure room, Mr. Steele? That's what it sounds like to me."

"Why go to the expense otherwise?"

"But in doesn't necessarily follow it was built to hold Egyptian art. Old George was quite the world traveler. He could've wanted to show off any number of collections. Dinosaur bones. Souvenirs from the Orient."

"Except none of the rooms we've seen answers that description. And I believe we thoroughly explored the public rooms while we were here on honeymoon."

"You're right. A secret room, then. And James Beverley was in on the secret."

"Appears that way, doesn't it?"

Laura nodded, but rather absently, and began to pace. "1951," she said. "Twenty years after that expedition, the one Claudio Malatesta was part of. The timing could be a clue."

"Putative expedition. There's no proof it went any farther than the planning stage."

"It did. I'm convinced of it. If only…There has to be something, somewhere…"

An idea was brewing in that lovely head of hers; Remington recognized it from experience. That was why he kept quiet while she strode back and forth in the little open space there was. It didn't do to derail her train of thought at this juncture, not when it might produce the brilliant deduction that would tie the loose ends together in a twinkling.

"George was a dedicated scholar, and detail-oriented to a fault," she was saying. "He kept everything: research notes, letters from colleagues, first and second drafts of his papers. Remember those files at Sotherton Manor?"

Truth be told, a sleep-fogged blur had effectively blotted out Remington's memory of the contents of said files. But he knew what was expected of him, and nodded an affirmative.

"Translations…classics…" Laura's voice had sunk to a low mutter. Suddenly she stopped short, swinging to face him with a sparkle of triumph and a puzzling non sequitur. "_The Rich are Different._"

"On the whole I'd have to say I agree, but do you really think that sort of value judgment is helpful to the case?"

"Susan Howatch, published by Ballantine Books, 1977. A Wall Street millionaire who's a closet classics scholar hides copies of his correspondence with his mistress in the works of his favorite poet. Was it Ovid? No, Catullus…"

She darted past him towards the bookshelves. He followed. "It's become a habit with you, you realize, drawing inspiration for our work from fiction. 'Four Ghosts in Shakespeare'? _The Buccaneers_? Where's it going to end?"

"Are you implying that books are a less legitimate resource for solving crimes than movies? Or jealous I'm stealing your thunder?" From the top rung of the stepladder that allowed access to the upper shelves, she challenged him with raised eyebrows.

"Don't be absurd, Laura. It's just that film annotations are so—so-"

"So much more up your alley than mine? Here." She began to heave a series of heavy volumes into his outstretched arms: _The Literature of the Ancient Egyptians. Ancient Records of Egypt, Volume I: The First to the Seventeenth Dynasties. Ancient Records of Egypt, Volume II: the Eighteenth Dynasty. Ancient Egyptian Literature Volume II: The New Kingdom. Ancient Egyptian Literature Volume III: The Late Period. _Each made a solid thump as it landed on the top of the stack he was holding.

"So much more stylish," he said, finishing his thought. "Original. They lend a detective a certain _je ne sais quoi_."

"Whatever you say, Mr. Steele. I think that's everything that pertains to Egypt. Put them on the desk."

Having done what she asked, he turned back to her and offered his hand; she put hers into it and jumped lightly to the ground. Together they bent their heads over what on the surface resembled the prized possessions of a man of letters, handsome books with tooled leather bindings and titles done in gilt.

They had only to work their way to the middle of the pile to discover that Laura's flight of fancy was on target. The three volumes that comprised the _Ancient Records of Egypt_ were actually receptacles for documents. So cleverly did they camouflage their purpose, whoever had commissioned them hadn't bothered to include locks in the design.

Concealed in Volume I was a paper trail that confirmed what the Steeles had already partially surmised. George Beverley was an organizer and major subsidizer of an Egyptian expedition that had departed Bristol in February of 1931 by privately owned steamer. So was Claudio Malatesta. The group had sought and received the imprimatur of the British and Egyptian governments.

And that was where the sordid taint of criminality began to manifest itself, at least for a man who knew how to read between the lines.

Remington did. He also knew what to look for. After all, he had years of experience behind him; smuggling had once been as much his métier and milieu as art theft. When he found the proof he wanted, he lined it up side by side. "My, my, my. What have we here." It wasn't a question.

"Something interesting?" asked Laura.

"Something incriminating." He beckoned her closer. "This is the ship's manifest, the one prepared for official inspection prior to departure from Egypt. "This"—he gestured towards the papers on the right—"is the _real_ list of the cargo _The Bombay Queen_ was carrying."

"It's a lot shorter."

"Compare them item by item, and you'll understand why."

There was no need for him to fill in the blanks for her. After rapidly skimming the manifests, real and faked, she glanced up at him with eyes alight. "So they _were_ tomb raiders," she breathed.

"Extraordinarily successful ones, by the look of things. It's not everybody who can spirit a solid-gold ritual bed, complete with headrest, as well as an entire throne, out of the Sahara."

"Blatant theft, all right. But how did they sneak it past the authorities?"

"Any number of ways. Bribery is the likeliest. It's virtually a way of life in that part of the world."

"So they plundered a foreign country's heritage, greased an official palm or two, and got away with it scot-free." She paused. The faraway look was back in her eyes, Remington saw, displacing the spark of a moment ago. "Or did they?"

"Did they what?"

"Get away with it. We know they brought contraband back to England, Mr. Steele. But who exactly made the return trip?"

He couldn't have claimed he could intuit what she was thinking. She had, as so often happened, outstripped him with regard to her skill in weaving logical connections between a handful of disparate clues. But he could happily take direction from her, and apply himself to the task of finding a confirmed roster of the passengers _The Bombay Queen_ had carried from Port Said to Bristol in March of 'thirty-two.

In the meantime she was tackling the papers housed in Volume III. Well before she spoke, her abrupt indrawn breath alerted him that she'd made a significant discovery. "It's a draft of a letter James Beverley wrote to the Egyptian Ministry of Culture," she said. "As far as I can tell, it was never sent."

Remington proceeded to read it—and had to suppress his own astonishment. For James Beverley's reason for contacting the ministry was to confess guilty knowledge of stolen antiquities, which he offered to restore to their rightful owner, i.e. the Egyptian government. The draft was dated March of the previous year.

But that wasn't all. "Brace yourself," Laura warned him, and handed over another letter.

_Dear Mr. Steele_:was its opening line. He met Laura's eyes. "What is this?"

"Just read it."

The letter continued:

_I am writing to inform you of a recent change I have made to my will—a change that will affect you directly, as you shall see in a moment. I should as well like to secure your services for an indeterminate date in the future. _

_Rest assured that this is not an attempt to be cryptic or mysterious. I cannot tell you the date because I do not know it myself, not yet. It will be the moment of my death. _

_There is a sensitive matter that I trust no one but you to handle, the exact nature of which I cannot—_will not—_divulge at this time. That it involves family is as much as I will say. Above all my concern is for my dear wife, Catherine, and any children she may bear me. During my lifetime I will do all I can to see that this does not touch them. I hope that you, Mr. Steele, will protect them when I have, as they say, "'passed on"'._

_Perhaps it will come as a surprise that I should entrust an affair of such extreme delicacy to a young man in whose company I have spent scarcely a quarter of an hour. To that I can only reply, I flatter myself that I am an excellent judge of character. Your prompt relinquishment of any claim to the identity of my poor son as soon as it became clear you could not be him impressed me enormously, as did the skill with which you found me in the first place. My admiration extends to your wife, whose good sense, courage and discretion were of immeasurable help in the unpleasantness surrounding my brother-in-law a year ago. You have my permission to relate the whole of this letter to her. I can think of no two people so deserving of my confidence than you and she._

_Now, as to my will. I shall render payment for your services in the form of Ashford Castle, a property in Ireland that has been in my family for over two hundred years. Sadly, we've never valued it as we should have done. I believe it a fitting recompense for an Irishman who seems through his talent and ability to have made something extraordinary of himself, despite growing up fatherless. And who knows? Perhaps it will lead you to your father._

_Further details will be forthcoming through my solicitor who, needless to say, is not privy to the secret. Until then, Mr. Steele, I remain,_

_Your obed't servant, etc., _

_James Beverley, Earl of Claridge, Viscount Sotherton, Lord Finross_

Praise for his good deeds hadn't become so routine that Remington could absorb it blithely and then move on. Especially when it was from a toff like the Earl, someone he'd have robbed in the old days if given half a chance. He sat quiet, collecting his wits. Though he never glanced in Laura's direction, he felt her eyes resting on him, loving, supportive.

Finally he raised his head. "I don't understand."

"I don't either. But it does answer a lot of questions, the important ones. How much he knew about his father. Why he left you the castle."

"Yes, of course it does, but that's not what I meant." He motioned towards the letter. "We should've heard all this a year ago. Why didn't we? Eh? It certainly would've made life a little easier."

"I think I know. Roselli got to him before he could finalize his plans. The letter's dated a few weeks before he died. It really is-" There she broke off, flushing pink.

"What?"

"I was thinking, it's really a request from beyond the grave." Compulsively she shivered and then sent him an apologetic smile. "Sorry. It spooks me."

"No…no. You've described it perfectly. It _is_ a summons from the grave—an irresistible call, as it were. Strange, I've been so obsessed with Roselli, I'd almost forgotten."

"That the Earl is dead?"

"That I owe him a little something." He paused to gaze at her fondly, his moral center, his good angel. "I even forgot the reminder you gave me not so long ago. But you didn't. Did you?"

"You give me too much credit, Mr. Steele. I can be selfish, too. And more focused on what's happening to you…to us…than on other people."

"It'd be an enormous undertaking, Laura, provided we survive Roselli. That is, if we've assumed correctly what it is the Earl meant us to do."

"Restore the treasure to its rightful owners. Make restitution somehow."

He nodded. "Shall we do it, my love? For his sake?"

"And Catherine's."

"And Catherine's."

Soberly they gazed at each other. That this was bigger than they'd expected was a given, but it was also an opportunity to help two people whose life together had been brutally ripped apart. And wasn't that what he and Laura were in it for? Remington asked himself. To light a single candle whenever possible? The triumph of good over evil?

She wanted to do it. He could see it her eyes. So he held out his hand to her as he had earlier; once again she laid hers in it, and laced her fingers with his.

"Yes?" he said softly.

"Yes."

* * *

It was Laura's idea that they go their separate ways, the better to speed up the investigation.

She put it to Remington over a late breakfast in the guest house that morning—and in terms not altogether flattering to him. "Legwork, Mr. Steele. Need I remind you it's _not_ one of your favorite activities? And that's what checking the newspaper database at the National Library of Ireland for references to Claudio Malatesta will be. Legwork."

Considering that, he rubbed his hand along his jaw. Scratchy with stubble, it was; he hadn't yet bothered to shave. He was also in a touchy mood. Short sleep always did that to him, rendered him easily annoyed and petulant. Not to mention rather resentful that he could detect no corresponding ill effects in his wife, who was as bright-eyed and energetic as ever.

Those were the reasons why the criticism stung him more than it should have, temporarily overshadowing the real issue. "I'm perfectly capable of handling legwork, Mrs. Steele. It's just you're unwilling to give me the benefit of the doubt."

His surliness hadn't dented her good mood in the least. "You hate it and you know it."

"Nevertheless." He took a gingerly sip of his tea and pulled a face. "This is horrid, by the way. Remind me one of these days to show you how it's done, brewing a proper cup."

She didn't take up that gauntlet, either. "_Someone_ got up on the wrong side of the bed today," she observed, helping herself to a muffin.

"Ah, wonderful. I suppose that's a prelude to a lecture on my bad attitude?"

"Just making conversation."

She ate in silence, but with evident enjoyment; he watched her morosely for a moment or two. "How do you propose I occupy myself, if I'm to be left behind?"

"You could start by hunting for the secret room."

"What, in broad daylight?"

"Why not?"

"The hotel's not exactly empty. I may be seen."

"So?"

"So don't you think it'll look rather odd, if not downright suspicious?"

"Who cares? You own this joint, Mr. Steele. If you decided to take a stroll through the halls naked, that's your prerogative."

On another day the image, and the fact that she was the one who'd conjured it up, probably would've tickled his funny bone. Now he scowled at her. "Always on the lookout for ways to undermine my dignity, eh, Laura?"

Over the rim of her cup she rolled her eyes at him, but said nothing.

After she'd gone off to take her bath, though: that was when he began to ask himself the serious questions. The National Library was in Dublin, on Kildare Street, if he recalled. Did she actually intend on undertaking the journey alone, without him to watch over her? Was it too late to persuade her from it?

If he offered an objection, would she even give him a hearing?

That was the nub of the matter. Today was the first time since Roselli had ransacked their hotel room in Boston, and she'd divined his and Murphy's plan to erase their nemesis from the picture without her knowledge, that this particular dilemma had reared its head. Laura still held the upper hand, as well as the high moral ground. He'd acted on his overwhelming desire to protect her; it had backfired spectacularly. How could he press the point, gain the advantage, without igniting the old quarrel?

He couldn't. He had to face it. Come hell or high water, Laura would do what she was determined to do. Woe to the husband who attempted to stop her.

Worry was an excellent cure for a bad mood. By the time Laura appeared, dressed and ready to leave, his snappishness had dissipated. On the contrary, it was with almost a sense of shame that he trailed her about as she donned her jacket and picked up her handbag. "I don't like you going off to Dublin by yourself, you know," was the sole protest he lodged.

"I'll be fine."

How often had he heard that from her? Indeed, it was almost her mantra. He could've parroted it word for word and saved her the trouble.

Instead he handed her the agency gun. "Here."

She accepted it without comment. "I'll be back as soon as I can. And I'll call if I find anything." No doubt the squeeze and pat she gave his rear was meant to substitute for a good-bye kiss. "Happy hunting, Mr. Steele," she added, and was out the door, headed for the garage to pick up one of The Ashford's estate cars.

It was stupid to stew over it, he decided immediately; it would only increase his frustration and wouldn't solve a thing. Besides, he was basically a man of action, at his best when his skills were engaged in some contest. In that respect seeking the elusive secret room—a room that might not even exist- was as good an occupation as any.

The first step was a thorough exploration of the castle's exterior. Here his excellent eye for proportion and photographic memory served him well. At the end of his circuit of the entire perimeter, he could visualize the exact position of every room he knew, including the placement of windows and doors. Now it was a question of pinpointing the discrepancy in dimensions between the outside and the inside.

That took a little longer, and drew the attention of guests and employees, just as he'd predicted to Laura. To cover he dispensed a smile and wave and a cheery "good day" to whomever crossed his path. Playing the lord of the manor, he was. It was rather amusing, and an effective means for lulling a truly suspicious mind into complacency.

He found what he was looking for on the second floor of the west wing: a corridor that ended in a blank wall. It was a lapse in symmetry with the first and third floors, which terminated, he realized, in windows. Sure enough, a knock on the wall yielded a hollow sound. By his calculations a good ten feet stretched between here and the outer wall.

But running his hands over every inch of plaster failed to reveal a way in, no hidden door, no sliding panel. Baffled, he stared at the ceiling without seeing it. And then he murmured: "Of course!"

Five minutes later, he was directly overhead in His Lordship's private study, displacing furniture and rolling back rugs. The trap door was let so cleverly into the floorboards that only an expert could've spotted it. It wasn't very difficult to lift, either, after he studied it long enough to comprehend the mechanism. He propped the wooden square against the desk and shined his torch into the hole.

A sturdy ladder extended downward seven or eight feet. It looked safe enough to him. He wouldn't have resisted the temptation in any case. Removing his shoes—it didn't do for someone to overhear him tramping around down there-he made the descent.

His first impression was that the air was surprisingly dry, probably the result of a ventilation system. Advancing a few steps from the ladder, he stopped and directed the beam of his torch along the walls.

The light glinted on the glass of twenty-odd showcases. And from inside them, the soft luster of alabaster, the gleam of gold, the glitter of colorful gems. There were bracelets and anklets, scarabs and amulets, pendants, collars and pectorals. Shrines, chests, daggers, statuettes, fans, lamps, vases, jars, walking sticks, caskets and chests, more than he could count. He stood open-mouthed, awed, dazzled.

It was the Egyptian treasure.

* * *

He had to conceal his elation and excitement over the discovery he'd made. And he had to get to Laura. Those were the only goals worth a damn to Remington as he crossed The Ashford's lobby en route to the guest house.

It seemed he was destined to defeat on both counts when Mikeline blocked his path.

Or perhaps not. For in his breathless eagerness to please, Mikeline was the bearer of good news. "Your Ladyship on the phone for you, Your Lordship. Urgent, she said it was. I'm to find you however long it takes."

"And so you have, Mikeline, so you have. Lead me to her, there's a good man."

Nothing could've rated urgency on Laura's part except a breakthrough on Claudio Maltesta: that was what Remington thought, picking up the phone. He was completely taken aback to hear her say, "Remington, Roselli's here, in Dublin. I've tracked him-"

"_What_?"

"Roselli. I tracked him to the Port of Dublin, and I've been sitting outside this warehouse for the past hour in case he comes back, but he hasn't. It's our chance to check it out."

Remington shook his head, trying to clear it. Events had sped up without warning; he felt as if he couldn't keep up. "Wait, wait a minute. You saw Roselli? Where?"

"On the street near the library-"

"Did he see you?"

"No. Remington, listen, you have to get down here, now. There's no time to lose-"

He grabbed the nearest pencil and paper while she dictated the address. "Port Tolka Quay Road, the last warehouse on the left hand side, just before Terminal 2. And Remington? Hurry."

"On my way." At the last minute he couldn't help adding what he knew he shouldn't: "And don't do anything reckless in the meantime, will you?"

"I'm not the reckless half of this team, remember?" she said crisply, and rang off.

It wasn't until he was well on the road to Dublin that it occurred to him that he hadn't told Laura about the treasure.

Well, never mind that; he'd plenty of time. Meanwhile the journey that normally took half an hour, tops, was prolonged by an additional twenty minutes, thanks to the ancient Fiesta that lurched out in front of him just outside Glen Creagh and proceeded at a sedate pace for the next fifteen kilometers. Circumstances made it impossible to pass on the two-lane track. Resisting the urge to lay on the horn, but only barely, Remington drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and cursed softly through his teeth.

He'd known the Port of Dublin fairly well, back in the day. It was little changed, crowded, bustling, with warehouses, offices, the harbormaster's quarters and terminals crammed cheek by jowl along the quays. To be safe, he left the estate car he'd commandeered in his turn one street over on Alexandra Road and walked to the warehouse. He scrutinized the environs from a discreet vantage point for signs of Roselli before approaching Laura's car.

From the looks of things the delay in his arrival was just as detrimental to Laura's patience as it was to his. "Nice of you to join me," she commented as he slipped into the passenger side. "I was just about to go ahead without you."

She was being uncharacteristically snide. He didn't care for it at all. "Without me?" he echoed. Drawing the Colt from his jacket pocket, he began to inspect the clip.

"Well, what do you expect? For me to wait around for you all day?"

"Actually, Laura? That's precisely what I _do _expect. You're the one who's drilled it into me over and over, ad nauseam. 'We're a team'. 'You don't go into dangerous situations without me'. Unless, of course, we're operating by that bloody double standard again, do what I say, never what I do, because God forbid anyone should second guess-"

She cut him off. "I'm going to repeat it once more, Remington, and that's it. I mean it. I…can…take…care…of…myself."

The last sentence was enunciated with maddening, exaggerated slowness. As a fresh assault on his temper, it was too much. Aggrieved, insulted, he abandoned the day-long battle he'd waged to bridle his tongue. At last he was going to speak his piece, and, by God, she was going to take notice.

"Splendid," he said. "Go ahead. Have at it."

That stopped her in her tracks. Expressionless, he locked the Colt's safety and returned it to his jacket pocket. Then he crossed his arms and sat unmoving, arms folded, eyes front.

It was clear he'd stymied her. "What are you doing?" she asked.

"Taking you at your word."

"You mean-"

"That's right, Mrs. Steele. Here's where your wish is granted at last. From now on, it's—what's the expression? Hands off? It's completely hands off when it comes to looking out for you. As far as I'm concerned, you're on your own."

There was a brief interlude during which neither of them said anything. Then she opened the door on her side and climbed out, only to hesitate again. "Aren't you coming?"

"I believe you already know the answer to that."

To her credit she didn't waste another second, but slammed the door and headed towards the warehouse with her usual confident stride. Watching her surreptitiously, he had to admit that it did surround her, the aura of a woman who could take care of herself. It was visible in every move she made. It was there in the way she reached for and handled her gun, flicking the safety off, poising her forefinger around the trigger. It was there, too, in the way she paused as she eased the entrance open, sweeping the area with a keen gaze. With a final glance over her shoulder at him, she stepped inside the warehouse, and was swallowed up.

He would commit that backward glance to memory more fervently than either of them could've dreamed.

Truly his plan was to sit tight until she walked back out of that door. After that, who knew? But he hadn't accounted for the self-reproach that smote him as soon as she disappeared from view. He fumbled for the door handle. Of course he couldn't let her go in there alone! What the devil was he thinking? So fast did he tumble from the car, he tripped over his own long legs and went sprawling. Up in an instant, he sprinted for the warehouse.

When he fell the second time, he wasn't sure what had caused it. The ground trembling beneath his feet, the concussive roar of ten thousand thunderclaps multiplied by ten, the blood-red-and-orange fireball shooting towards the sky, the acrid stench of smoke: those had to register with him first.

It was the sight of the inferno raging where the warehouse once stood that set him to screaming Laura's name.

Any hope of coherence deserted him at that point. A crowd of onlookers gathered quickly, he was aware of that much. At the same time he was charging the warehouse—he had to get to Laura! He had to save her!-but a dark-haired figure that incredibly turned out to be David Flannery in a boiler suit leapt on him from out of nowhere to pinion his arms and hold him back. "You can't, Mr. Steele!" Flannery was shouting. "It's too dangerous! You can't go in there!"

Swung around and knocked the daylights out of him, Remington would have, if Flannery and another man weren't gripping his arms. He fought and raved like a lunatic against those restraints for what felt like hours. The two men didn't let him go.

And then physical exhaustion took over, numbing him as efficiently as a sedative. Dazed by a nameless emotion deeper than horror, struck dumb by abject disbelief—how could this be happening?—he watched from a distance, through clouds of roiling smoke, as the engines of the Dublin Fire Brigade raced towards the scene and screeched to a halt. Men poured off the sides and out of the doors, uncoiling hoses, unleashing powerful jets of water, combating the fire with an unflappable professionalism that was equal parts comfort and affront.

Remington watched and waited, still unbelieving.

The warehouse roof stove inward and collapsed in a shower of deadly sparks.

Two walls shivered, slowly, noisily disintegrated, and sank into ashes.

The fire brigade toiled four hours, five, six, to quench the last of the flames, and began the painstaking task of shifting the still-smoking debris.

Laura never came through the door.

TO BE CONTINUED


	22. PART II: Chapter 8

**A/N: I want to apologize for the time it's taken to post this chapter. Sensitive to your requests (cheffie, rx9782, monica, MJW, monstercurl, merelle cordere, Suzie Rose) I tried, I really did try, to update more quickly than usual. But I serve as a volunteer wedding coordinator, with a rehearsal and ceremony last week (in 100° weather) and a ceremony today (with my report time ****1:30**** from now.) Plus I've been interviewing for a new job. Please know that I'd never leave you in suspense on purpose, and am always grateful for your enthusiasm and support.**

**~ MG  
P.S. If you enjoyed it, a comment would be greatly appreciated. I sort of need the "love" right now.**

Chapter 8

He lay on the bed in the darkened guest house, still dressed in his soiled clothes, and waited for whatever would happen next.

So far nothing had.

Though it was past nine o'clock when he finally departed the Port of Dublin the previous night, the Fire Brigade had accomplished little beyond raking over the topmost layer of debris from the blaze that had burnt the warehouse to the ground. It might take a day or two to recover a body, he was told, or as much as a week. Immediately he'd formed the resolve not to stir an inch from the spot until…until he _knew_.

Until he'd seen it—_her_—with his own eyes.

Flannery had persuaded him against it. "Don't do this to yourself," he'd insisted, practically marching Remington to his car. Flannery had already offered a ride, which Remington turned down with a near-savage grunt. "Mrs. Steele wouldn't ask you to. Go back to the hotel. Take a shower, try and get some rest. I'll call you as soon as...well, as soon as I hear anything."

It had occurred to Remington to round on him, this man he intensely disliked and essentially distrusted, who shared the blame with Roselli for the circumstances the Steeles were in, if not for this latest turn of events, and pound him with questions. Who did Flannery think he was, telling Remington what his wife would've asked of him? How did Flannery know they were staying at The Ashford? Who'd invited him to charge in and take over? And what the hell was he doing here in the first place?

In the end Remington was too drained and weary to summon the energy. All it would amount to was empty excuses. And what use were those? They wouldn't bring _her_ back, would they, if she was really gone?

He made it back to the guest house unnoticed, which was exactly the way he wanted it. In the bathroom mirror he was accosted by a face he barely recognized. Against its pallor the eyes were bloodshot and shadowed by violet circles, the lips a grim line within a frame of dark stubble. If that weren't enough, he reeked of smoke. He desperately needed a wash and a shave and a change of clothes.

Instead he flicked off the light, drew the curtains in every room, and cast himself on the bed, not to sleep, but to dream of a reality that no longer existed, one in which the warehouse never exploded; in which Roselli hadn't lured _her_ to it; where she never took the bait and fell into his trap.

A reality in which he, her husband and so-called protector, hadn't made the most colossal error in judgment of all, and failed her for the third and final time.

Therein lay the nightmare. Only it wasn't a nightmare, but the reemergence of an old, old pattern. He'd built a new life for himself, a life that offered the threefold gift of genuine love, happiness and stability. Under their influence his vigilance had relaxed. And then, as soon as he was convinced he'd no longer anything to fear—his luck had changed, he was on Providence's good side at last—the props were kicked out from under him, all he'd grown to depend on destroyed, and he was left standing in the ruins.

Alone. Again. By his fault, by his own fault, by his own most grievous fault.

Hadn't he predicted it? Last October, that was, on the occasion of their six-month anniversary. They'd had a conversation in which he'd revealed the true extent of his pessimism; she had tried her level best to talk him out of it, because that was the sort of woman she was. She'd also warned him not to take it too far, his conception of Roselli as his nemesis. Roselli doesn't have supernatural powers, she'd argued. He's a fallible human being just like we are.

Perhaps so. But in this case, fallibility had sufficed. Roselli had triumphed.

He might not have, if Remington hadn't aided and abetted him. Mustn't forget that minor detail.

He wouldn't. He was, as well, already determined not to live in denial. Above all he was a realist. He'd simply to copy _her_ example of self-control and force himself to relinquish the last shard of hope, the one he was holding onto with everything in him. Someone in an official capacity, the Fire Brigade or the Garda, ringing up to tell him it was a misunderstanding, they'd found her unharmed in what remained of the warehouse, and they were even now en route to The Ashford with her. When they arrived she would be out of the car and running before it came to a stop. And as she crossed the guesthouse's threshold she would open her arms to him…and he would hold her close to his heart, and never, ever let her go…

That look. That backward look she'd given him with her hand on knob of the warehouse door, a mixture of doubt and guilt and reproach, unlike her. Excruciating to realize such was his last glimpse of her, but so it was.

To his dying breath he'd not forget it.

The disadvantage to possessing a vivid imagination was you couldn't shut it on and off at will. At moments like this it was almost a curse. He had to turn over, screw his eyes shut and smash his face into the pillow to expel the image from his mind. Otherwise he'd have completely cracked and either gone stark, staring mad or been reduced to a sniveling wreck.

Except that he'd yet to discern in himself any inclination towards tears. That surprised him. He'd suffered no lack of them several years ago upon discovering what he thought was her lifeless body slumped on the stairs of her loft, felled by a bullet in the back. Not even verbally committed to her, he'd nevertheless blubbered and babbled like a fool. Now, having drunk deep of the delights of marriage to her, he was by comparison as dry-eyed as she herself would be. Would've been. Perhaps her reserve in that regard had rubbed off on him. How she diverted she would be—would've been—by this latest example of role-reversal.

But he'd wept for Anna in Monte Carlo, he remembered, wept inconsolably as soon as he finished reading the newspaper report announcing her death. Why? He couldn't understand it. What the devil was _wrong_ with him? Why for a treacherous, double-dealing con artist, and not Lau—not for his wife, the best person he'd ever known?

Whose name he'd begun over the course of the morning to avoid saying or thinking. That was unusual, too. He'd shouted it often enough last night, God knew. And it had long been the word that passed his lips most frequently. How he'd congratulated himself on making free of it in the early days, before matters between them warmed to the point where she permitted those casual touches—the stroking of her hair, his hand resting on her lower back—that were life's blood to him. A substitute for intimacy, her name was then. Its precursor, too. Nowadays it served on its own as an endearment, in its softness as beautiful as she was. Just two nights ago he'd alternately cried it at one point of climax, and murmured it in her ear at another…

What he ought to have been doing was telling her he loved her.

Should've, but didn't, not once. He was more concerned with coaxing reassurances from her, shoring up his own masculine insecurities. But if he had that night to do over? He'd have said it again and again and again, making up for all the occasions when he'd failed to overcome his stupid, outworn reticence and kept silent. He'd have told her how blissfully happy she made him. And he'd have professed that not only would he have married her again, he'd have asked her far sooner, immediately after pulling her back onto that beam above the Federal Reserve Bank, his first terrifying taste of what it would be like to lose her.

A dress rehearsal, as it were. A run-up to the real thing. As was the night Karl shot her. Roseill's attack at the agency. Her poison-induced illness in Pramagiorre. Her disappearance from their ransacked room at The Eliot.

Ah, but none of them could match reality for its total emptiness, the inescapable weight of finality, the bleakness of despair.

Had he flattered himself once upon a time that living without her would be possible—bitter and tormented, yes, bloody lonely, certainly-but achievable at some future date? He wondered at his own naiveté. For in the space of a few hours he'd come to realize that he'd underestimated the devastation that permanent separation from her would wreak on him. His survival was by no means guaranteed.

And wasn't that fitting? For how could Remington Steele continue to exist without Laura Holt to love him and to believe in him?

He'd have willingly, with boundless gratitude, given his very life not to be asking that question.

* * *

At two in the afternoon he was standing in what he judged to be a pathologist's examination room, bracing himself for his final sight of his wife.

The phone call from Flannery had come at one o'clock. "She's been taken to hospital. You're to come straightaway to-" he hesitated "—claim her."

Remington closed his eyes. "Where?"

"Mater Misericordiae. Need a ride?"

Declining to waste his breath on the obvious, Remington didn't reply. A fraught silence fell.

"St. Agnes's Ward," Flannery said, sounding uncomfortable. "Ask for Matron O'Dacy. I'll meet you there."

It was only after Flannery had rung off that Remington noted two things: the lack of any expression of sympathy, and that Flannery's speech suddenly seemed to have acquired a brogue as authentic as his own.

It registered and then Remington promptly forgot it. He'd a hard enough duty ahead of him as it was without puzzling over the other man's behavior. The formalities at the hospital were only the beginning of the ordeal, he knew. Next would be trans-Atlantic phone calls to Abigail and Mildred, Frances and Donald, Murphy and Sherry, Bernice Giacomo if he could trace her, his wife's colleagues from Havenhurst, her friends from college, sundry former clients and contacts in California.

How was he supposed to deliver the news that she was dead?

It didn't bear thinking of. He hadn't the courage for it. After a quick shower, filled with trepidation, he was off to Dublin to do what had to be done.

Matron O'Dacy wasn't the stout, Mildred-ish figure he anticipated, but a long-legged blonde not much older than he. It was she who led him to an elevator, up into the heart of the hospital, and left him in the examination room. This was a large, antiseptic-smelling space, painted a dull green, prominently outfitted with a stainless steel table. He'd seen its like before when calling on Deputy Coroner Rossfeld in Los Angeles and tried to avoid looking at it. Meanwhile, if Flannery was about, he didn't appear.

That was fine by Remington. Preferable, in fact. He needed these unobserved moments to collect himself for what lay ahead. All morning he'd refused to dwell on it. But he'd been raised in rural Collooney; he'd witnessed the ravages of fire, and the damage it did to a human body, many times. He knew he was about to view a grotesque distortion that bore no resemblance to the girl he loved.

It scared him. He had never in his life been so scared. And that included the incident in which Roselli had mailed them a post mortem photo of Gladys Lynch, and it struck Remington what a near thing it had been that _she _had escaped Lynch's fate, and he'd vividly pictured her in Lynch's place, the victim of strangulation.

He was listening for the wheels of a stretcher or gurney rolling in from the hallway, not the rapid patter of light footsteps he actually heard, so it didn't penetrate that they had anything to do with him. Behind him a door opened. Even as he turned towards the sound, a slight figure crossed the room and was throwing its arms around him.

"Come here, come here…oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry…" said a feminine voice that even in its anguish held a beguiling lilt.

He staggered. For what seemed to be ages, but was likely mere seconds, his thoughts froze at their source. His hands were in motion, though, those sensitive fingertips that for years had served as the most reliable tools he possessed in his thief's quest for treasure. Only now they were exploring a treasure of a different kind. The smooth, heavy fall of hair, the fine-boned face, the slender curves: he'd have known whose they were, could've picked her from among hundreds of women, thousands, by touch alone. Yes, it was her, his lovely love, and that meant the silent, wrecked shell of his waking nightmare was exactly that, a nightmare, a figment of his imagination. For here she was, soft and warm and breathing…

Alive. _Alive._

A hoarse whisper was all he could force through the sudden constriction in his throat. _Laura_.

The two syllables might have been an incantation designed to reverse an evil spell. The minute he said them aloud, the reality that had taken shape last night, the one he'd just begun to accept, melted away. And then, as his arms closed around the wife he thought he'd lost, Remington Steele did something he'd feared he was incapable of in the first hours after her supposed death: openly, unashamedly, began to sob his heart out.

Laura was crying, too—Laura! _Crying_! This unprecedented development had the effect of tilting his world on its axis again. For a frantic second he was certain he was suffering from a delusion, and _this_ was the dream after all.

It wasn't. The proof was in her wet cheek pressed to his. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she wept. "I thought you knew. I thought Flannery told you. I waited and waited for you to come…And then when you didn't, and I asked him why not, he said-" the tears were coming so hard and fast she could hardly speak through them "—he said…they were letting you believe I was dead…"

At that juncture she broke down entirely. Of course he couldn't have cared less about her explanation. He cared about nothing but her. He'd have drawn her into his very soul if he could've figured out how. As it was he had to be content with maneuvering her to the examination table and lifting her onto its edge, there to envelope her as completely as he could. Or was it she who enveloped him? For with a gentle hand she held his head to her breast, a gesture he recalled from other times he needed comfort, and she'd given it without his having to ask.

For a couple who spent ninety-nine per cent of their time arguing, bantering or just chatting like the old friends they were, it was a moment memorable for its lack of conversation. All they could manage was broken gasps and indistinct murmurs. But perhaps those said enough. The soft sounds went on for a long time.

At last he straightened and tenderly tilted her face up between his cupped hands. "Let me look at you," he said; his voice was thickened by the tears he'd shed. And he did look, unaware that there was something new burning in his blue eyes. "Not hurt, are you? Hm?"

Tear tracks still glistened on her cheeks, and the tip of her nose was pink, but he'd never seen her smile so radiant. "Not a scratch on me," she said. "Really. Not so much as a hang nail."

"Before you came in I was bracing myself for—well, never mind what I was bracing for. The important thing is you're here, and alive, and-" Now that the initial shock and wonder and exhilaration of reclaiming her was beginning to fade, it hit him what an impossible feat that really was. "Laura…why _are _you here and alive? By rights you shouldn't be. Nobody could've survived that blast, let alone the fire."

"Flannery got me out of the warehouse-"

"_Flannery_?"

"—Or rather, two of his men did. He's had me under lock and key ever since."

"But how could he even know-?"

"Roselli was spotted in Dublin over the weekend. Flannery flew in from London the same day we did. I'm not sure how or when, but he re-triggered the booby trap to make it look like I was inside when it went off."

Certain remarks she'd made at the onset of their reunion, ignored because they were incomprehensible, came back to him. Flannery already here in Dublin? Flannery with foreknowledge of Roselli's trap? Yes, that made sense; Remington had had a queer feeling all along that there was more to Flannery's role in this disaster than faithful watchdog. But what about the other questions, most notably Laura's disappearance and prolonged absence?

Time to put their heads together, his and Laura's, and discover the solution to the enigma.

He said: "You'll have to start from the beginning, because right now I feel like I've come in on the wrong reel of a movie."

"That makes two of us. And you know how I hate that metaphor, Mr. Steele."

Picking up after she'd entered the warehouse, the gist of her story was this:

Two men, Americans, were positioned just inside the door, and immediately took possession of her arms. They apologized profusely for frightening her, neither of them hurt her, but she was unable to wrench away from their grip. They would show her their ID's and give her an explanation shortly, they promised. Their first priority was getting her out of the warehouse as quickly as possible.

All of this had transpired in under two minutes. Outdoors, the men had steered her to the wharf and down a flight of stairs to where a motorboat was moored, pilot at the wheel, engine running. As it headed towards open water, one of the men pressed a button on a remote control device. Though she didn't see the actual explosion, the noise and smoke and fire left her in no doubt about what had happened.

There was also no doubt that the two strangers, who by then had introduced themselves as U.S. Army Intelligence, had saved her life. Shaken by how easily she'd swallowed Roselli's bait, she stopped protesting her enforced captivity. And then she remembered Remington, and started pleading with the soldiers to take her back to the harbor. My husband was right across the street, she told them. He'll think I'm trapped in the fire. We have to let him know I'm alive.

The soldiers were polite—she would even have described them as kind—and seemed genuinely sympathetic to her distress, for she was on the verge of tears. They were also immovable. After a fifteen minute ride, they anchored the boat at a private jetty, led her ashore and transferred her to a car. The driver followed a westbound route that led to a quiet residential block of two-story brick houses set close to the street. Ushering her into a second-floor bedroom in one of these, the soldiers locked her in ("protective custody, ma'am, Captain Flannery's orders") and left her.

As jails went, hers was homey and comfortable, but that didn't make her any less a prisoner. Within a matter of minutes she'd confirmed there was no way out, thanks to one guard posted outside her door and a second on patrol beneath her window. There was nothing to do but sink down onto the bed and wrestle with her anxieties.

Here Laura paused. Her hand sought Remington's. "I couldn't stop thinking about you, alone, watching," she said. "You had to be going out of your mind."

The experience was too fresh and raw to discuss, even with her. Soon, however, when all of this was behind them. "Yes, indeed, a performance to rival Veronica Kirk, minus the fainting," he said dryly. "I'll wager Roselli made sure he had a front row seat somewhere, the better to enjoy the spectacle." To divert her from probing further, he added, "What about Flannery, Laura?"

"He finally showed up around ten. Not that I could get much out of him at that point. Just that he'd tinkered with the timer and set-up enough to get me out safely. He said that since Rosellli believes he's succeeded in murdering me, the smartest thing we can do is maintain the charade. Flannery's the one who brought me here, by the way. He'll be back soon."

"He admitted he left me out of the picture, didn't you say? How did you manage it?"

"I knew you would come for me, because you always do. When you didn't show I thought it could only mean one thing, Roselli had gotten to you somehow. I was so afraid for you."

Remington was familiar with the feeling. Freeing his hand from her clasp, he encircled her shoulders. "Did you try and make a break for it?"

"No, but I made the inside guard's life so miserable, it was either bring Flannery to me, or lose his sanity."

"There's my girl, eh?"

It was the first laugh they'd shared since they were restored to each other. All too quickly she grew somber again. "He was so dismissive, Remington. Flannery. That's what I can't forget. Like it didn't matter what you were going through, as long as it didn't interfere with his plan. His precious plan…I think it's all he cares about. I can see now why you're so skeptical about him."

"You don't know the half of it. Did he never tell you he was on the scene with me last night?"

Her eyes widened. "He was?"

"Kept me from attempting a rescue. Shooed me off to the hotel once the fire was under control with a solemn oath to let me know when you—your body-was found."

"Oh, my God."

"Yes, I've the feeling he's been playing his cards rather close to the vest all along, our gallant captain has."

"Close to the vest?" The surprise in Laura's dark eyes was rapidly yielding to anger. "It was downright cruel! And uncalled for! Damn him! He's been treating us like a couple of pawns he can move around on a whim!"

"Much like Roselli himself."

"_Exactly _like Roselli! Talk about the cure being worse than the disease-" He heard her abrupt intake of breath. "Remington, I just remembered. There was a dead body in the warehouse, near the rear exit."

The skin at the base of his neck instantly began to creep. "Whose? Not Roselli's."

"Those guys hustled me by it so fast, I didn't get a good look. But I think it might've been one of the Primi brothers."

"Which, under the circumstances, is almost as good."

"Two down and one to go?"

"You're read my very mind."

"I wonder if Flannery knows about it."

"Let's make it a point to ask him, shall we?"

If ever the expression "speak of the devil" was apt, it was at that moment: like an actor responding to a cue, Flannery entered the room. "Sorry to interrupt, but it's getting late. Time to get this show on the road."

The Steeles went forward to meet him. "What show is that, Captain?" Laura said sweetly. Too sweetly. It was a tone of voice Remington knew well; despite his security in the knowledge it wasn't directed towards him, he winced. A pity Flannery had no experience with it.

He definitely looked oblivious. "The next phase of the plan," he was saying with an affable smile. "Sit down and I'll brief you."

No sign of shame or an apology. Not even an acknowledgment of what the Steeles had suffered. Whether it stemmed from arrogance or indifference, the callous disregard for the human angle was appalling.

And infuriating. Rage swelled in Remington. It wasn't so much for himself that he minded, but for Laura, who'd borne the brunt of Roselli's malevolence from the start. Relishing the chance to feed his anger, he ran the images through his head: Laura huddled in a heap on her office floor for more than an hour, her injury neglected; shivering in his arms, small and disconsolate, in the moments after that hideous travesty of a press conference; her stricken eyes as he, Remington, broke the news that they might never be able to go home to Los Angeles.

Wound him up, those memories did. Without consciously planning it he found himself moving in on Flannery with clenched fists. A burst of pain in his knuckles, radiating up his arm to his shoulder, and then Flannery was reeling back with his hand to his jaw while Remington snarled into his face. "You should've told us what you were planning!"

To give Flannery credit, he was no milksop, but turned Remington's aggression right back on him. "Is that so? Is it Laura's funeral you'd be after, then? Blown to bits, so you'd nothing left to bury?"

"You frightened the life out of her, snatching her away-you lied to my face and pretended she was dead!"

"And is she not here, no worse for the wear? Would she be, if you knew all along it was naught but a show? Consider the question carefully, me bucko. And understand you've not the poker face you think you have where she's concerned."

"What the bloody hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I saw it with my own eyes on the plane to London. Jesus, but it was written all over you. Pretending she was a stranger, you were, but you gave the game away the minute you looked at her. Just like you'd have given it away last night, if I let you."

This time it was Remington's turn to waver under a well-placed blow, only this was to his pride. He opened his mouth to retort, but Laura was already charging to his defense. "That's a lie! We've worked together for years—he never breaks his cover because of me. You saw what you wanted to see and now you're using it to justify yourself. He had a right to know! We both did!"

Flannery regarded her impassively. "You're entitled to your opinion, Mrs. Steele, but remember something. You're not the ones in charge here." He grabbed a couple of straight chairs from a corner and thrust them into the center of the room. "Now. Sit. Down."

It was unmistakably a command. Issuing it transformed Flannery from a fairly ordinary, amiable guy into an officer who brooked no disobedience. In the blink of an eye he had become formidable.

The Steeles sat.

"And now," Flannery said, "here's how I'm planning to keep you out of my hair until we—that's me and my men—catch or kill Niemand."

Though it could've been worse, it was bad enough. Flannery's actions the previous night had been a calculated risk, a means for turning Niemand's attempt on Laura's life to Flannery's advantage. That was the reason for secreting Laura in residential Dublin and withholding from Remington the information that she was safe. Flannery had hated to do it, but there was no denying Remington's display of genuine grief was an asset; Flannery was confident it would seal Niemand's conviction that he'd gotten away with Laura's murder at last.

Twenty hours later, Flannery had every reason to believe the groundwork he'd laid was solid. With Niemand's attention diverted from Laura—and the illusion that she was dead intact—Flannery could proceed to move both Steeles into protective custody. Laura would depart with him in a few hours. After playing out the rest of the charade, part of which would entail his accompanying a fake casket onto a U.S.-bound flight, Remington would be allowed to join her.

"Exactly where are you planning on taking us?" Laura demanded.

"France. I understand you have a home there."

"You're putting us under house arrest?"

"Technically? No. You won't be able to leave…you'll have guards to make sure you don't wander off the reservation…but it's protection, not jail."

"And if we refuse?" Remington, having heard in Flannery's references to last night the cold-bloodedness Laura had described, was spoiling for another fight.

"Then I _will_ put you in jail. Federal prison in America. Separate cell blocks. Maybe separate states. Am I making myself clear?" Flannery's unsmiling gaze bored into Remington's. Without waiting for a response, Flannery added: "Good. If you have questions, now's the time to ask."

Laura spoke up immediately. "To tell the truth? I don't see how you've gotten away with all this…destruction. Let alone the fire department, the police, this hospital…Does the Irish government know what you've been up to? This isn't exactly your home turf."

"Actually, it is my home turf. Sort of. I spent every summer of my life in Dublin until I was twenty-one. The house you stayed at last night? It belongs to my father." A faint smile flitted across Flannery's lips, gone almost as soon as it appeared. "My loyalty is to my oath and my country, Mrs. Steele, no matter where I'm posted. I try to keep the damage to a minimum, but it's not always possible."

Remington raised a brow. "Does that include the body Laura saw in the warehouse, Flannery? Eh?"

"That was supposed to be her welcoming committee. Eusebio Primi. Niemand was making damn sure she didn't walk away alive this time." Flannery's expression twisted slightly. "Primi had a camera on him."

That grim detail put matters into perspective for Remington in a way that nothing else could. It also reconciled him slightly to Flannery's gall. If not for Flannery's intervention, he would've been the recipient of a gruesome post mortem photograph of his wife like the one he'd envisioned earlier. The mere idea made him physically recoil.

Laura's reaction must've been similar, for Flannery was saying, "You're in over your heads, Mrs. Steele. You have been since the beginning. It's time you understood how much." Briefly he related the consequences of his wild goose chase to Northumberland five evenings prior: the disappearance of the colleague with whom he'd scheduled a meeting but was forced to cancel at the last minute. "Lieutenant Frye. The Garda found him down by the river two days ago. He was beaten to death."

Flannery fell silent, allowing the import to sink in. Probably the guilty glance the Steeles exchanged—when all was said and done, it was uncomfortable to recall the glee with which they'd dispatched him on the trail of that tourist motorcoach—satisfied him. He checked his watch. "Our flight to Nice leaves at four, Mrs. Steele, so I'll give you a chance to say your farewells. You have ten minutes, and then I'll be back with your disguise."

It wasn't often that Laura showed her vulnerable side to virtual strangers, but she did now. Rising to her feet to confront the exiting Flannery, hands cupped around her elbows, she said with an audible quiver, "Does it really have to be this way, Captain?"

"It really does. I'm sorry. Ten minutes." And Flannery closed the door quietly behind him.

Ordinarily the Steeles would've sprung into swift action, searching for an escape route. But this wasn't an ordinary moment. Propelled by the pace of events, they moved full-tilt into each other's arms. Too much to say, Remington was thinking. Too little time to say it in. The curse of lovers everywhere, wasn't it?

Naturally Laura had to take a stab at expressing it all before Flannery reappeared. "Remington, I-"

"Sh." He silenced her with a look. "Later. Let me kiss you a proper good-bye."

He drew her down with him into the chair he'd just vacated, simultaneously memorizing and remembering the feel of her in his arms as she curled into his lap. Truly he meant to keep a rein on his ardor, to spare them both the physical frustration. But at the first touch of her lips, he couldn't hold back, he needed to taste her, he needed to drive down into her sweetness and breathe her in and devour her, welcoming her back from the dead as thoroughly as he had Anna in another lifetime.

Laura had twined her fingers in his hair and was making those sounds low in her throat, the sounds that signaled enjoyment and eagerness and encouragement. That was when the words began to spill out of him, almost as if they had a will of their own. He let them come. Perhaps if he gave them their head, they would lead him where he wanted so desperately to go: beyond endearments, beyond praise of her beauty and sexiness and what she as a woman did to him as a man, to the fundamental truths he'd learned last night, how inextricably he was bound to her, the blackness and depth and width of the void her loss had created, and how preferable death was to living without her.

Reluctantly he pulled his mouth free of hers. "Laura," he gasped, and heard the harsh rasp in his voice. "I love you. I don't—I can't…Don't leave me ever again. Please. Please…"

He faltered and stammered to a halt. It was lack of practice that had tripped him up, and not of intention; there was some comfort in that. But he hadn't the heart to try again. Miserably aware of his shortcomings, he clung tightly to her, tipped his forehead until it rested against hers and closed his eyes.

And wouldn't meet hers as she said: "Remington."

"Hm?"

"Look at me."

Slowly he lifted his head, and could've wept again at the sight of such love.

"I know," she said. "I do know. It's all right."

"No, it isn't. Don't let me off the hook so easily, Laura."

"I'm not." She touched his cheek. "Finish the picture."

"The picture?"

"The sketch, the one you started on our anniversary. Bring it with you to the villa. And show me. Promise?"

He did.

Just in time, too, for with a sharp, warning rap Flannery insinuated himself through the door and handed Laura a parcel. He was wearing a black soutane, a priestly robe Remington remembered from childhood and whose name he hadn't known until he traveled to France and Italy, topped with a matching low-crowned, wide-brimmed hat. "I'll be right outside," Flannery said. "Knock when you're ready to leave."

Unwrapped, the package revealed a habit, complete with veil and wimple. Unlike the one she'd worn on the plane from Boston, this one was white and seemed to be authentic. The choice was a stroke of genius on Flannery's part, given Mater Misericordiae's identity as a private, Roman Catholic hospital. Perhaps the Yank could be trusted to keep Laura safe, not that he, personally, could stop him from trying, Remington thought.

And so, contra his desire to undress his wife, he helped her into the voluminous garments that would conceal her identity and preserve her life, not because she wasn't capable, but because it offered him a precious opportunity to be close to her. He held the sleeves of the gown while she slipped her arms into them and zipped her up. He smoothed her hair beneath the wimple and draped the veil over it. And then with his hands on his shoulders, he turned her to him. "I'm never letting you out of my sight after this, I hope you know."

"You'd better not."

They kissed lightly. The caress provoked tears that neither tried to hide; each seemed to sense instinctively that on a profound level it was necessary for the other to glimpse them. It was only when Flannery entered, summoned by Laura's knock, that they hurried to regain their composure. As always their private emotion wasn't for public consumption.

Except in the penultimate moment. Halting her progress, Remington grabbed her hand, bent and pressed his lips to it. She laid her other hand on his hair, soft as a blessing.

Ahead of them Flannery blew out an impatient sigh. "Go back to the hotel, Mr. Steele. I'll call later with your instructions."

Their departure left Remington with an acute consciousness of his empty arms, his aching heart, so fleetingly solaced, so quickly bereft, as well as the loneliness that awaited him at the guest house. Three things he did have, however, to sustain him:

The assurance that his dearest love was beyond Roselli's reach, possibly for good.

The memory of Laura's final, tender glance as she disappeared through the door.

The knowledge that in a few days, he would see her again.

TO BE CONTINUED


	23. PART II: Chapter 9

**A/N: Just a quick note to say, I got the job! Thank you for your good thoughts, and, for those who prayed, your prayers.**

**I'm getting acclimated to the new environment (today was my first day), but have made changes in my writing routine that will help me to make better progress in posting. As always, I appreciate your indulgence and patience, your support and feedback. More than you know!**  
**~ MG**

Chapter 9

"Like it or not, we're going to be spending a lot of time together for the next few weeks," Flannery said. "You'll have to talk to me at some point. Besides, open communication is good for the soul…Sister."

Those were the first words Flannery had addressed to Laura since their flight had taken off from Dublin. Occupying the window seat to his left in her masquerade as a nun, she didn't raise her head from the in-flight magazine she was pretending to read. Ordinarily she wouldn't have given it a glance. But the paperback she was in the middle of was back at The Ashford's guest house, along with the rest of her belongings. Those would arrive at the Steele's villa in Menton after Remington packed them up and sent them on—one of the jobs Flannery would assign him later when phoning him with his "instructions." Until then, Laura would have to make do on a variety of fronts. And right now her most pressing need was a pretext to avoid interaction with Flannery.

It had puzzled her to find they were flying commercial to Nice. She'd expected some kind of military transport at the very least. But no: the driver of the dark sedan that picked them up outside the hospital had headed straight for Dublin Airport and dropped them off at the area designated for international departures. There a third man had joined them and accompanied Laura and Flannery into the terminal. Something about him, probably his ramrod-straight back, suggested he ought to be in an Army uniform instead of the plain dark suit he was wearing; the crisp nod he gave Flannery seemed to camouflage a salute. Without introducing himself to Laura, he fell into step behind them, presented his boarding pass at the counter and followed them onto the plane. Now he was seated ahead of them in row number four. Whether to thwart a would-be assailant or to guarantee she didn't bolt, Laura wasn't sure.

Not that she had any intention of trying. If the last two days had taught her anything, it was a healthy respect for the capabilities of the man next to her. Previously she'd allowed Remington's scorn, product of what he considered Flannery's dilettantish performance in chasing Roselli, to cloud her judgment. Thus she'd come to view Flannery as easily dismissed, easily fobbed off, easy to fool.

She wouldn't make that mistake again.

Respect was one thing; liking was something else. Flannery had forfeited any claim on her friendship by insulting Remington earlier. The hell Flannery had put her husband through was bad enough. But to imply Remington had earned it by a lapse in his professionalism-! And to rub his face in it when he was at his most vulnerable-! Her dander rose again just thinking about it.

Anger was the perfect distraction. It stopped her from dwelling on the pain of separation from Remington—pain that their brief reunion at the hospital had only intensified. She almost wished Flannery hadn't brought them together in the first place. Or did she? Which was worse? To have her husband in her embrace for a few precious minutes before they were torn apart? Or to be marched off into exile without seeing for herself that he was all right, holding him, comforting him? She would've needed to toss a coin to decide that one.

Especially since neither of them had any idea how long it would be before he came home to her. Flannery hadn't furnished any specifics. Three days? A week? More? But maybe he'd built some flexibility into his plans. And maybe, just maybe, he could be persuaded to hurry the situation along, and transfer Remington to Menton sooner than anticipated. Recent appearances to the contrary, Flannery wasn't completely unreasonable-there was a good possibility he'd be open to compromise if she talked to him—

Oh.

From the corner of her eye she noted Flannery watching her as if waiting for a reply. She schooled herself to respond with a cool, level stare instead of the spitting fury she was dying to unleash. "I agree, it's in my best interest to cooperate with you," she said. "But let's get something straight. That punch my husband threw at you at the hospital? He had my full support. In other words, Father…what you did to us is _not_ okay."

"I did what I had to, to save your life." Flannery's accent was pure American again. "The same way I would've saved your husband's, if he'd gone into the warehouse with you. Why didn't he? I thought you always worked as a team."

That was an issue for Laura and Remington to thrash out once their lives had returned to normal. In the meanwhile, she was damned if she was going dredge it up simply to satisfy Flannery's curiosity. She deflected him with, "I have an idea. Why don't you let me ask the questions for a change? And give me some honest answers? Since we'll be spending so much time together. I've heard communication's good for the soul."

"Cagey, Mrs. Steele. Very cagey."

Laura nodded her thanks for the compliment.

"And I bet I can predict the first question. How did I figure out what Niemand was up to?"

"How did you?"

"It was Pete Frye, to be honest. He filed a report the afternoon he disappeared. All I had to do was follow up on his information."

"And spin it into a plan of your own."

"It was a long shot, but the best chance I had of taking you out of the line of fire for good."

Laura closed the magazine and put it away. "That's where you lose me. You must've had us under surveillance, watching Niemand watch us. Clearly you assumed he'd try to lure me—us—into his trap."

"That's about the size of it."

"Then why not just capture him, and save yourself the trouble?"

"Remember I told you, he's too smart to do the dirty work himself. That wasn't Niemand you trailed from the library yesterday."

"Cristiano Primi?"

"Cristiano Primi. Who's now been in custody for almost twenty-four hours." Flannery tried on a conciliatory smile. "See? We're not as incompetent as Mr. Steele likes to think we are."

That point was debatable in Laura's opinion, but she allowed it to pass without comment. "And Niemand?"

"Flying under the radar again. But we'll get him, I swear. It's just a matter of time."

It was on the tip of Laura's tongue to remind him that he'd offered similar assurances in the past, assurances that had amounted to nothing. It wasn't the most diplomatic observation she could offer, if she hoped to win him over with regards to Remington's arrival at the Villa Montreuil. Firmly she resisted the urge and said, "As long as he buys into this scenario of yours. What makes you so sure he will?"

"Long, painful acquaintance. Cooperation from the hospital and the mortician in case Niemand starts asking dangerous questions. They'll back up the story that your body was brought in, identified and prepared for burial. It helps to have connections, Mrs. Steele."

"Your father?"

"Is a well-known attorney—what they call a barrister over here. The assistant to the administrative head of Mater Misericordiae is an old friend of mine. Sharla O'Dacy. I owe her big for this one, believe me."

For a man who prior to this afternoon had been close-mouthed about his activities, Flannery had suddenly become downright garrulous. A day late and a dollar short, Captain, Laura admonished him, although not aloud. From his expression she deduced he was expecting, even inviting, her admiration and approval. Well, to hell with that. And to hell with currying favor, pleading Remington's case with him, too.

So she ignored his pathetic gambit to elicit praise from her and turned the conversation in the direction she wanted it to go. "By the way, what _is_ Niemand's real name? You do know it, don't you?"

Flannery looked surprised. "Of course. Anthony Giardina from Roxbury, New Jersey. I really didn't tell you?"

"You really didn't." Giardina, she was thinking. The Primis' mother's maiden name; the connection she always suspected existed between them and Roselli—and a new clue she'd uncovered at the National Library. It was good to know she hadn't lost her touch, even if there wasn't a damned thing she could do with the information.

Her inattentiveness appeared to bother Flannery, or maybe he saw it as a chance to win her back to his side. "I know you don't trust me or my methods," he said. "The truth is, I had to play the cards I was dealt. I did the best I could. I wish you could see it that way."

"All right, you've convinced me. It's a well-thought out plan, maybe even brilliant. Congratulations." Her bitterness was morphing into sarcasm; she saw Flannery's brow furrow as he registered it. "But for the sake of argument, here's a question. How do you think your wife would react?"

"My wife?"

"You did tell us you're married, didn't you? Say someone treated her the way you've been treating my husband, lying to her, manipulating her. How would she feel about that? How would _you_ feel when you found it?"

The last traces of animation drained from Flannery's face; she had effectively punctured his buoyant mood. At first she thought she'd also offended him, which didn't cause her a moment's distress. But then she got a good look at the sadness in his eyes and the lines that bracketed his mouth, and realized she'd missed the mark.

"I'm a widower," he said.

"Oh." Now it was her turn to fall silent after a hastily murmured, "I'm sorry." And she really _was_ sorry, enough to touch his sleeve as a thought struck her. "You don't mean Niemand-"

"No. God, no. It was cancer, ovarian cancer. By the time she was diagnosed it was already spreading. She died last Thanksgiving."

Just under six months ago. Sympathy was tempering Laura's grievance against him in spite of herself. She was also remembering a throwaway remark from the night he first made his presence known to her and Remington and aligning it with the facts she'd just learned. "That's why you've only been on the Niemand case sporadically. You took a leave of absence so you could be with her."

"Nine months. At the beginning it sounded like a lot of time." His gaze traveled past her and out the window. "It went by faster than I ever dreamed."

"What was her name?"

"Christine."

There didn't seem to be much else to say. But when they settled back into their respective seats, it was with a tentative new footing forged between them. Or it would have been, if Laura hadn't hardened herself against it. Flannery of all people had firsthand experience of grief and loss; he lived with it every day. He should've put himself in Remington's shoes, understood how Remington would react to her faked death, and adjusted his plan accordingly.

There was nothing she could do to change that now. There was also no chance that Flannery would ever be more to her and Remington than an obstacle in their quest to bring Roselli to justice. Poor guy. Too bad he didn't know the Steeles had two ways of dealing with obstacles: maneuvering around them, or undermining them.

She wondered which approach they would use on Flannery.

* * *

Roughly three days later, convincingly established in his role as grieving widower, the tasks imposed on him by Flannery accomplished, Remington, too, was on a plane to Nice.

By then he was heartily sick of air travel. No wonder: he'd been at it for most of the previous forty-eight hours. First there was the staged departure from Dublin, where he'd looked on from the terminal while an empty casket was unloaded from a hearse supplied by the ever-obliging Niall Donegal of Donegal & Sons and hoisted into the cargo hold of a jetliner. Soon he was boarding the same Washington, D.C.-bound flight as a passenger. Upon landing in D.C. seven hours later, his minders—two American soldiers lying in wait for him at the guest house on his return from Mater Misericordiae—had executed a series of maneuvers that landed him on a second jet, destination London. Barely had it touched down at Heathrow before he was hustled off to a small plane on a private air strip. On takeoff he'd recognized immediately that they were headed for France at last, and heaved a sigh of relief.

Though almost four days had passed since the explosion, he was not yet altogether himself.

That was unnerving, even a trifle embarrassing. Always he'd prided himself on being the resilient sort, a man who took the lumps life dealt him, absorbed them and then moved on without suffering discernible side effects. Granted, in the past he might've brooded for a few days over an experience such as the one he and Laura had just been through; another layer of cynicism would've accrued as the result of Flannery's treachery and hardened like scar tissue over a flesh wound. But he, Remington, would've eventually regained his perspective, his ability to laugh at himself and circumstances, and bounced back. He wouldn't have segued into gloom so deep he was beginning to fear it might become permanent. He wouldn't have awakened three nights running from shouting, sweating nightmares that left him too shaken to court sleep again.

As the cliché went, there was a first time for everything.

There was also a cure; she was waiting for him in Menton. Thank God for Laura. While he knew himself well enough to know he'd not confess his weakness to her, he was certain her mere presence would restore him, if not totally to normal, then near enough to make no difference. Her strength and common sense, not to mention her perfect little body: yes, he was counting on them to send the demons fleeing. He had the utmost faith in her. The two of them were, after all, better together.

What she wouldn't be able to banish was the incredible anger that rode him now.

Nor did he want her to. That anger was a private matter, and his to nurse as he pleased. Sprung to life as soon as he got a good look at Flanney's smug, hypocritical face the afternoon after the explosion, it had never really died. And why should it? Hadn't Flannery arbitrarily excluded Remington from his plot to save Laura? Hadn't he disparaged Remington's abilities within her earshot? Hadn't he offered the worst humiliation of all by whisking her away to Menton as if Remington was unequal to the responsibility of protecting her? Those resentments still seethed in Remington, seeking release. They would need no provocation to explode into violence the way they had at the hospital.

Yet all of it was tame in comparison to what he felt for Roselli.

Well, that was nothing new. He'd been stewing in that particular brand of fury at one level or another for the better part of six months. What had changed was his expectation that in the end, it would be his hand that meted out the vengeance Roselli deserved. He'd been depending on it, really, finishing the job he and Murphy had started in Boston. Although he wouldn't have put it in so many words, the deepest part of himself recognized how necessary it was to him as a husband…as a _man_. And now Flannery was depriving him of that, too.

Finally the little plane touched down in Nice, and it was off to Menton via the Autoroute. Remington spent much of the ride dozing, head against the cushion of the Daimler sedan's rear seat. Intermittently the voices of his escorts in animated discussion of something called spring training drifted back to him. Tedesco and Meecham: tough on him at first, but their watchfulness had relaxed in direct proportion to the hours he accumulated in their custody without attempting to give them the slip. No doubt he should have told them at the outset that they'd no reason to worry. How were they to know that making a run for it was the last thing on his mind? That he wanted nothing more on earth than to go home to Laura?

Possibly that explained the jolt of adrenalin that roused him as they picked up the Lower Corniche. A casual sightseer's attention would've been attracted by the azure expanse of the Mediterranean to the right; he cared only for the soft green hills on the left. He couldn't really see the rue Ferdinand Bac from here, of course. But his imagination, always so active, was quick to supply the details. The hillside staircase whose steps he would ascend two at a time; the low stucco villa glowing pink against its backdrop of olive trees; the big common room, as refreshing as a lemon ice on a hot day…

The lovely young lady, chestnut-haired and dark-eyed, who was both the impetus for his journey and the reward at its end.

He found her swimming furious laps in the pool behind the house.

Ignoring the urge to sweep her up, he looked on for a few minutes. It was plain to him immediately that she was working off excess energy rather than taking exercise. Or more specifically, pushing herself to physical exhaustion. He was familiar with the signs. Haunted by memories of the explosion, frustrated with a turn of events that prevented her from pursuing the mystery of the Egyptian treasure, she was doing her damnedest to blot out her thoughts.

And missing him? Ah, they'd soon remedy that.

Finally she surfaced at the deep end of the pool and groped for the edge. Bending down to meet her, he grasped her hand. "_Bathing Beauty_," he said as he lifted her out of the water. "Esther Williams, Red Skelton, Basil Rathbone, MGM, 1944. Made Esther one of the most popular pin-ups in the States, it did. But she can't hold a candle to you."

He'd have wrapped her towel about her, but Laura rendered it unnecessary by jumping into his arms and clinging to his neck, legs wrapped around his waist. "Mr. Steele! Oh-!"

A man couldn't ask for a more exuberant welcome from his wife. He held her hard, dripping little armful that she was, and laughed beneath the greedy kisses she was showering on his face and throat. It took a while to capture her mouth and keep it pressed to his own, but once he did—well, thought, perception and memory seemed to spiral down to a single point until there was nothing left to him but pure sensation, submerged in the feel and taste and scent of his Laura, as he'd longed so desperately to be these interminable days without her.

When he raised his head sometime later to take a breath, it was with the sense that they weren't alone. Sure enough, there was a soldier stationed near the patio door, scarlet with embarrassment. "Oh, hello," Remington said. To Laura he added: "Who's that?"

"Sergeant Tyrone."

"Oh. Hello, Sergeant Tyrone."

Sergeant Tyrone mumbled something and averted his eyes.

"I think we're making him uncomfortable," Laura commented in a stage whisper.

"Splendid piece of deduction, Mrs. Steele. Shall we leave him to it?" Remington was striding towards the patio with her. "And take our reunion inside?"

"Mr. Steele, I thought you'd never ask."

Neither of them could resist flashing big grins at Tyrone as they passed him. They found Meecham and Tedesco standing about the living room, who knew for what purpose; in no mood for dealing with Flannery's subordinates, the Steeles breezed by them, too, and made straight for their bedroom.

It was what they'd been pining for since Flannery had parted them, to be alone together, behind closed doors. As soon as he set her on the bed she was on her knees and tugging his damp shirt out of the waistband of his jeans. He in the meantime availed himself of the first chance he'd had to fully appreciate the red bikini she was wearing. "New swimsuit, eh?"

"Gilbert's granddaughter picked it up for me." Gilbert Trottier was the villa's caretaker. "It's a little more…revealing…than I'd like."

"Nonsense. If you've got it, flaunt it, my love." To underscore his words he loosened the ties that fastened the bikini top and tossed it aside.

Skillfully working his shirt buttons open, she sighed in pleasure as his hands teased her breasts. "I've missed you. I have so much to tell you."

"What an interesting coincidence. I've so much to tell you." He shrugged the shirt off and let it fall to the floor. Now was the time to mold her against him, skin-to-skin; already his body was surging with anticipation of the voluptuous joys that lay ahead…

But Laura pushed away from him slightly, palms flat against his chest, and tilted her head so she could scrutinize him more closely. "The truth about Claudio Malatesta, Roselli's real name and a very revealing insight from Flannery. You?"

"Oh, nothing particularly earth-shattering." He smirked. "Only that I found the treasure."

Her eyes lit up. "You did? How?"

"An unbeatable combination of application, skill and persistence." Badly as he wanted to make love to her, he could tell the moment was slipping away; the gleam in her eye was borne of the excitement of putting the puzzle together instead of desire for him. With a regretful sigh of his own he admitted it to himself and released her. "Is there anything in the kitchen worth scrounging? Breakfast was slim pickings at best, and I haven't eaten since."

She patted his shoulder. "Poor baby. I'll see what I can do." Completely unselfconscious in her bare feet and his discarded shirt, she padded off on her domestic errand.

So it was with an odd assortment of leftovers—a loaf of bread, slices of cold _veau aux olives_, the remnants of an anchovy-laden _pissaladière_,a couple of nectarines, a wedge of poivre d'âne and two cups of faiselle sprinkled with chopped hazelnuts—on a tray between them, and a bottle of Côtes de Provence rosé to wash the impromptu meal down, that they stretched out on the bed, and exchanged their news.

Laura went first. And her bombshell was big: nothing less than Claudio Malatesta's obituary, discovered in an Italian newspaper during the course of her microfilm research at the National Library. "1951 in Alexandria, Egypt," she said. "Cause of death unknown. But there was a list of the family he left behind. His widow, Altovese, sons Tiberio and Anastasio, and a daughter. Antonia Giardina of Roxbury, New Jersey." On this last tidbit she gazed at Remington expectantly.

He blinked. "Is that supposed to mean something?"

"Roselli's real name is Anthony Giardina. Care to guess where he was born?"

"Roxbury? So he's-"

"Malatesta's grandson. Now that you're here, you can check it out with Murphy. But I'm almost positive he is."

"What do you make of the rest of it? The fact that Malatesta died in Alexandria, for example?"

"I'm guessing the Egyptian authorities got wind of the smuggling operation, and Malatesta ended up being the fall guy. Back in those days Alexandria was the site of a penitentiary for long-term offenders—one of the few in the entire country. As a prisoner of the state, Malatesta would've been sent there." Laura paused to sip her wine. "It's only a theory. But it does fit."

"It also confirms you were right. Avenging his grandfather is the motive behind Roselli's vendetta against the Beverleys. And, by extension, us."

"It's that Ligurian blood of his, Mr. Steele. In my experience, blood will generally out."

His sentiments exactly, Remington thought. He was also aware of a tiny but insistent thrill of victory. In the midst of adverse circumstances, beset on every side, he and Laura had nevertheless unraveled Roselli's labyrinthine plot. Of course it was by no means assured that they'd defeat him in the end. But if they went down, it would be fighting to the last gasp.

He lifted his wineglass in a toast. "Well done, Laura. I take in you haven't confided any of this to Flannery?"

"You must be joking. But get this." And in a few terse sentences she related what she'd learnt about Christine Flannery.

Remington digested the information in silence. Then he reached for a lock of Laura's hair, curly now that it was dry, and wound it absently around his finger. "I can sympathize with him. Curious, isn't it? But not enough to excuse how he's behaved."

"Me neither. It does explain a lot, though. His single-mindedness. Why capturing Roselli is so important to him. He doesn't have anything else to care about. " Moving the tray out of the way, she wriggled closer to Remington. "Enough about him. Tell me about the treasure."

That was a happier subject; by the time they'd exhausted it, they were smiling. "You know, Laura, it occurs to me…there could be quite a hefty finder's fee involved, once we've restored the plunder to its home country," Remington ventured as persuasively as he knew how.

"I thought we agreed we're doing it for the Earl's sake, and Catherine's."

"So we are. But as long as a reward's on offer…and it was our hard work and dedication that brought the treasure to light…"

His wife was shook her head at him. "You and your finder's fees," she laughed, a signal that no escalation of the charm offensive would be necessary.

With two days' jet lag catching up to him, he wasn't up for it in any case—or much of anything else, either. Even his earlier hankering for a romp with Laura had faded. Yawning, he sprawled out more heavily on the featherbed.

It was only when he'd struggled into a sitting position, arms and legs still thrashing, ears ringing with his outcry of pain and fear, that he realized he'd dropped off to sleep.

Hours ago, by the look of things, for full dark had descended. Through the pounding of his heart and his labored breathing he was dimly aware that Laura had left his side and crossed to the door to hold a low conversation with someone in the hallway, a conversation he couldn't hear. Given the state he was in, he likely wouldn't have been able to make heads nor tails of it. But her absence began to chafe him. What in blazes was taking her so long? Was she never coming back to bed?

As soon as she did, she wrapped her arms around him. The negligee she'd changed into left her shoulders bare; he rested his forehead against the near one, and let the shudders ripple through him until his body finally stilled of its own accord.

His voice felt raw in his throat. "Nightmare," he croaked, stating the obvious.

"Sh. I know. And I'm here, sweetheart. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."

It was the refrain she'd murmured over and over to him for the past few minutes. Suddenly he wondered whether he'd said or done something whilst in the throes that had furnished a clue to the source of his terror. If she asked, how would he answer? Should he describe the dream sequence that unspooled in his head night after night to her? The endless loops of the warehouse blown to kingdom come, his frenzied battle with Flannery, the blackened, shriveled human remains that he'd thankfully never seen with his eyes, but his wayward brain persisted in conjuring up?

He couldn't. The words wouldn't come. He couldn't force them out now matter how hard he tried. Besides, there were other things they needed—_he_ needed—to air out between them.

Rolling away from her, he sank back on his pillow and stared at the ceiling, which somehow made it easier to speak. "I shouldn't have let you go in there alone, Laura. I never should've. It was stupid, and wrong."

He waited in no little suspense for a reply from her but was disappointed. "Say something," he prompted her.

"What do you want me to say?"

"That you forgive me."

"There's nothing to forgive."

"But I-"

"There's nothing to forgive," she repeated. "If you'd come with me, if Roselli's plan had worked like it was supposed to, you would've died, too. Do you think that's what I would've wanted?"

"It's what _I_ would've wanted," he whispered.

She sat up abruptly. At first he thought it was because she was angry, but meeting her eyes put paid to that notion. They were worried but affectionate. "Did you finish the sketch?" she asked.

Amazingly, in the mad shuffle between airports, he had. "It's with my things."

"I can't wait to see it."

Her wish being his command, as it were, he threw back the covers preparatory to leaping out of bed. "I could-"

"Remington, no." Catching his elbow, she held him back. "It's late. Come on, lie down with me."

To the accompaniment of squeaking bedsprings and rustling bedclothes they rearranged themselves. Yes, this was more like it; this was what he'd dreamt of: Laura spooned into the curve of his body, himself soothed by the rise and fall of her breathing, the circulating blood whose pulse throbbed beneath his fingertips. The evidence of her life, in other words. Gradually the residue of nightmare, stripped of its power, dwindled, and was forgotten.

Which made it possible to attend to what she was saying. Listening with all his ears, he was, for with the incredible clearsightedness that was her trademark, she was putting their fundamental conflict into context. "We'll have to figure it out at some point," she said. "Because the problem's not going away. You'll never stop wanting to protect me-"

"They'll be making snowballs in hell first."

"—and I have to follow where facts and instinct lead me in an investigation, even if it's dangerous. I can't help it. It's who I am." She hesitated and then took up the thread again, sounding uncharacteristically young and uncertain. "We won't lose each other over this. We waited so long for each other. We've fought so hard to make it work."

"Nothing'll ever tear me away, Laura. I promised you, remember?"

"So we'll search for common ground?"

"Wherever it's to be had."

She turned over to face him, and he thought what a paradox it was that her eyes should be so dark, yet simultaneously so full of light, luminous. "Kiss me goodnight, Mr. Steele," she said.

Through the drowsy haze that was stealing over him, he complied. First her lips. Her eyelids, one by one. Her forehead. Then her lips again. "I love you," he breathed.

"And I love you." She kissed his chest, just above the clustering curls, and rested her cheek on it; his hand slipped under her hair to cradle her head.

And that was how they fell asleep.

* * *

Life at the villa Montreuil quickly settled into a routine. And the routine, in turn, became grinding in its monotony.

That was because the Steeles' activities were tightly circumscribed, especially Laura's. It was the sensible way to handle it, in light of the fact she was presumed to be dead. No contact with outsiders. She couldn't make or receive telephone calls. No jogging along the rue Ferdinand Bac; no jaunts to town or the beach. The Steeles weren't even allowed to keep a hired car, dispatching the caretaker and his wife, Madeleine, to run errands and pick up supplies in their ancient Peugeot. Those were Flannery's orders. The soldiers guarding the Steeles enforced them unswervingly.

Flannery himself checked in every few days or so, sometimes by phone, once or twice in person. Mainly he addressed himself to the five-man security detail he'd assigned to the Steeles: Lieutenant Vitale and Sergeants Tyrone, Tedesco, Meecham and Khun. Flannery did offer the Steeles occasional progress reports, which they couldn't help but notice were inconclusive. He hadn't pinpointed Niemand's whereabouts. Niemand was still on the run. Or, as Laura privately translated to Remington, at liberty, at large, on the loose. Free to commit murder and mayhem when and where he wished.

They could've done a better job of catching him than Flannery was. Though neither of them said it, they were both thinking it. Instead they were prisoners in everything but name. As Laura had good reason to know from her overnight incarceration in Dublin, the fact that it was their own home made no difference. The confinement was just as irksome as if they were languishing behind actual bars and barbed wire.

The first week was the easiest. There was the sexual side of their relationship to occupy them, forty-eight hours in which they devoted themselves to making up for lost time, emerging from their bedroom only to shower or use the bathroom or eat the meals Madeleine Trottier prepared for them. By the end of day one, Remington was sure he noted a touch of envy in the glances the soldiers on their ten-hour rotations directed at him on the rare occasions they saw him. He was cheesed off at them enough to respond with a smug, pitying smile.

And why not? Just then he was an extraordinarily happy man, not least because of how the honeymoon sketch he'd done of Laura had gone over. She'd flushed as she studied it and then looked up at him with a wondering smile. "Do I really look like this?" she asked.

"Ah, no. It doesn't begin to do you justice. Perhaps when I've more experience, eh? After all, I'm only a novice. A mere dauber, really, an amateur-"

"Oh, stop. I get the picture. Pun intended." She'd tugged on his arm to bring his head down to her level and soundly kissed his cheek. "Thank you. And Mr. Steele?"

"Hm?"

"I love you, too."

They had even more fun distracting Sergeants Kuhn and Tyone so Remington could phone Murphy with a request to research the probable relationship between Claudio Maltesta and Roselli—a conversation from which Remington rang off quickly, before Murphy could pose any questions about Laura. It was both an excellent joke on the guards, and a confidence booster for the Steeles. To mix a couple of metaphors, even with their wings clipped, they could still run rings around the competition.

Unfortunately, the atmosphere at the villa went downhill from there. Not a bit surprising, considering they were two active, energetic people with nothing to do. Enticing as the prospect might appear at first blush, one couldn't make love _all_ the time. Or spend entire days reading, as Laura tried to do, or drawing, as he tried to do, or swimming, or sunning themselves. He grew touchy and snappish. She became restless and agitated. And, by the end of the second week, determined to take matters into her own hands.

"We've got to get out of here," she said sotto voce to Remington one afternoon. The sky was cloudless, the weather verging on summery; they were lounging by the pool while Vitale and Tedesco patrolled the villa's perimeter. "Otherwise I swear I'll go crazy."

"And I swear I'll join you. But I don't see how we're to manage it, in view of the odds against us." Remington inclined his head discreetly towards Vitale, whose military-issue weapon was prominently displayed—and ready to be used-in a holster suspended from his belt. "We may be armed, but I don't relish the idea of facing down trained soldiers. We'd be slaughtered, Laura. Literally."

"You're right." Laura turned thoughtful. "How do artifice and subterfuge strike you as alternatives?"

"Mother's milk, my dear. Who do you propose as the mark? Tyrone? He's a likely candidate."

"None of them. No messing around with the bottom of the chain of command. My sights are set on the top dog, Mr. Steele."

She meant Flannery, of course. As it happened he was scheduled to pay them a visit the following day. By then she'd cooked up a scheme so convincing, Flannery could hardly fail to be taken in. Physical fitness was very important to her, was what she would say. Was Flannery aware that she competed in marathons and triathlons? She needed the open road, fresh air in her lungs, the freedom to stretch her legs. Surely Flannery could understand that? And arrange something suitable? He could be the one to accompany her, if he was worried about her making a break for it.

"A trial run," she explained to Remington. "A chance to watch how he copes and pinpoint his weak spots so we can plan accordingly."

It worked. Two sentences in to her pitch, it was clear Flannery was hooked. Indeed, from Remington's vantage point Flannery was practically falling over himself to do Laura a service. "Give me a few days," he said. "I'm sure I can work something out."

For once he was as good as his word. Three days later he arrived in the black soutane and hat, and waited while Laura put the habit on over a tank top and shorts. Careful to preserve a façade of innocence, she avoided Remington's eyes, and offered him only a casual good-bye. But there was a brief flicker of her dimple as she passed him and followed Flannery out the front door and to his car.

The villa seemed rather empty and lifeless to Remington after they'd gone. Gilbert Trottier had gone to a neighbor's to inspect at a newborn litter of rat terriers, leaving the Peugeot behind. Of the men of the security detail, Khun and Tedesco were the most silent and stoical, and it was just Remington's sort of luck that they should be on duty today. The swimming pool wasn't nearly as attractive without Laura in her red bikini to adorn it. As a rule he didn't enjoy reading, and French television was a hopeless muddle.

But the moving image was a hard addiction to break. Besides, Canal + was showing a dubbed version of the American show _21 Jump Street. _He took up his usual position—flat on his back on the sofa—and watched.

When the first gunshot rang out, he thought it was part of the show.

The noise of the second gunshot propelled him from his seat and into the center of the room.

How long he stood there, ears strained to their limits for a sound, any sound at all, he didn't know. Tedesco's voice or Kuhn's, footsteps ringing on the patio's flagstones, the meaty of thump of blows landed on the body of an intruder, even another gun shot? But the house and grounds were totally silent.

It was the unbearable suspense that sent him towards the window overlooking the rear of the house. Looking for Tedesco and Kuhn, he was. At first he thought—hoped-they were unconscious. But the way Khun's face was crushed into the grass, Tedesco's sightless eyes staring skyward and the quantity of blood told him otherwise.

He would've run then, but the villa's front door was already opening. Heavy footsteps were already advancing across the floor. The hammer of a Ruger (the same gun he'd identified upon Miles Helmsley's demand at Paddington Station a year ago, he remembered) was being cocked.

Stiff with dread, he turned.

And for the first time since the previous September came face to face with his doppelgänger, Anthony Roselli.

TO BE CONTINUED


End file.
